1. There are stories which, whether written down or narrated, seem less plausible than they were when they actually happened.
   -- written by badgersandjam
   -- chosen by songofnewday and jeffr23
   
2. Marco da Cola, gentleman of Venice, respectfully presents his greetings.
   --written by Iain Pears
   -- chosen by sammywol
   
3. I never anticipated that my first experience with the scalpel would be with so ( Read more... )

Argh --

Sorry about the late. I brought the book to campus to post lines, and then managed to misplace it. Here now.

1. There are stories which, whether written down or narrated, seem less plausible than they were when they actually happened.
   
2. Marco da Cola, gentleman of Venice, respectfully presents his greetings.
   
3. I never anticipated that my ( Read more... )

1. Lance awoke with the thought that something had changed irrevocably
   -- written by dangerdean
   --
   
2. He looked upon the body of his father, blood staining the cracked earth upon either side of the cruciform grave and the dagger, the dagger that protruded through his corduroy jacket and gleamed.
   -- written by songofnewday
   -- chosen by sammywol
   
   
3. Whatever the circumstances of his ( Read more... )

So, we come to almost the last shelf on the bookcase, and again, hard to choose. But we're going with a mystery-ish book -- Iain Pears' An Instance of the Fingerpost, which I have yet to read.

The Blurb:

It is 1663, and England is wracked with intrigue and civil strife. When an Oxford Don is murdered, it seems at first that the incident can ( Read more... )

Choose, Indy!

1. Lance awoke with the thought that something had changed irrevocably
   
2. He looked upon the body of his father, blood staining the cracked earth upon either side of the cruciform grave and the dagger, the dagger that protruded through his corduroy jacket and gleamed.
   
3. Whatever the circumstances of his birth, Joseph of Arimathea died an ( Read more... )

1. Bardas glared at the interloper.
   
   -- written by dorianegray
   
   
2. Perimadeia: the famed Triple City and the mercantile capital of the known world
   
   --written by lanyer
   --chosen by sammywol
   
   
3. The dreams were always about screaming and smoke.
   
   --written by songofnewday
   
   
4. Above the city, he stretched out in his quarters and surveyed the landscape put into his charge; his sword hung on the ( Read more... )

This was a hard shelf -- lots of 19th C. novels, but the only ones with blurbs on the backs were too well-known, or were Norton Critical Editions, which have crit. blurbs, which are entirely useless. Lots of sf/f, and I was going to give you Geoff Ryman's Air, but I thought a recent Hugo winner might be too familiar -- and also wondered if you were ( Read more... )

Here they are!

1. Bardas glared at the interloper.
   
2. Perimadeia: the famed Triple City and the mercantile capital of the known world
   
3. The dreams were always about screaming and smoke.
   
4. Above the city, he stretched out in his quarters and surveyed the landscape put into his charge; his sword hung on the wall like an omen.
   
5. "Do the walls yet hold?"
   
6. ( Read more... )

And here are the lines and the scores!

1. “There's nothing for it - that's the only planet we can possibly make."
- written by dorianegray

2. Fins had been making wisecracks about human beings for thousands of years.
- written by David Brin
-chosen by badgersandjam

3. The dark metal of the the hull eclipsed the rippling sun.
-written bylanyer

4. Streaker crawled ( Read more... )

Hello, all! The third shelf is more sf/f -- Cherryh, Miéville, Gaiman, Pratchett, GRRM ... but you know all those, right? So this round's book is KJ Parker's Colours in the Steel, v. 1 of The Fencer Trilogy.

The Blurb:

Perimadeia: the famed Triple City and the mercantile capital of the known world. Behind its allegedly impregnable walls, ( Read more... )