Landed Quotes

Maybe it was easier if you knew your child was dead. It was a thought that stopped him in his tracks sometimes but he knew that it was the truth. If the child was dead then you had to figure out a way forward. It was being locked in this permanent state of limbo that was keeping Sarah in bed.One night he had come home from the day with a story of one of the young lads sliding through some fairly big cow pats. The boy had landed on his butt and there had been laughter all round. Restrained laughter but, still, it was funny. He had sat on the edge of the bed and related the story to Sarah and she had smiled and then released a small giggle. Immediately he could see her regret it and he had watched her bite down hard on her lip. Hard enough to draw some blood.
'It's okay, Sarah,' he had said gently. 'It's okay to laugh.'
'Bullshit, Doug,' she had spat back at him. 'How can you laugh if he's not laughing? How can I laugh knowing that he may be suffering?'
'I . . . I . . .' Doug had started, then he had left the room.
If a child died did it end this struggle? Could you put your faith in God and heaven and know he was in a better place, laughing with other children? Was that how you were able to move on? ~ Nicole Trope

What would you know of struggle, perfect son? When have you fought against the mutilation of your mind? When have you had to do anything other than tally compliance's and polish your armor? The people of your world named you "Great One". The people of mine called me slave. Which one of us landed on a paradise of civilization to be raised by a foster father, Roboute? Which one of us was given armies to lead after training in the halls of the Macraggian High Riders? Which one of us inherited a strong, cultured kingdom? And which one of us had to rise up against a kingdom with nothing but a horde of starving slaves? Which one of us was a child enslaved on a world of monsters, with his brain cut up by carving knives? Listen to your blue clad wretches yelling courage and honor, courage and honor, courage and honor! Do you even know the meaning of those words? Courage is fighting the kingdom which enslaves you, no matter that their armies outnumber yours by ten-thousand to one. You know nothing of courage! Honor is resisting a tyrant when all others suckle and grow fat on the hypocrisy he feeds them. You know nothing of honor! ~ Angron, Wahammer 40K

The bar was crowded with theorizing Sherlockians, who in the absence of any actual evidence had created grand machinations to explain the crime. Minor points of canonical disagreement became reasons for brutal murder. Some tried to piece together their theories in small groups, hoping that with enough brainpower and expertise they might arrive at a solution. Others jumped straight over the "investigation" phase and landed square at the end of the story they were creating, instantly accusing the man across the table of some vile treachery. And, moreover, actually employing phrases like "vile treachery" in doing so. Everyone was a suspect. But at the world's largest Sherlockian gathering, everyone was a detective as well. ~ Graham Moore

I did some theater as a kid for fun. But it was really by chance that I landed into acting. ~ Gaspard Ulliel

It is a formidable list of jobs: the whole of the spinning industry, the whole of the dyeing industry, the whole of the weaving industry. The whole catering industry and - which would not please Lady Astor, perhaps - the whole of the nation's brewing and distilling. All the preserving, pickling and bottling industry, all the bacon-curing. And (since in those days a man was often absent from home for months together on war or business) a very large share in the management of landed estates. Here are the women's jobs - and what has become of them? They are all being handled by men. It is all very well to say that woman's place is the home - but modern civilisation has taken all these pleasant and profitable activities out of the home, where the women looked after them, and handed them over to big industry, to be directed and organised by men at the head of large factories. Even the dairy-maid in her simple bonnet has gone, to be replaced by a male mechanic in charge of a mechanical milking plant. ~ Dorothy L. Sayers

But I try not to become preoccupied with that because with whatever direction I follow, with whatever advice I've followed or not followed, It's landed me in New York, in a very beautiful hotel, talking to people about something that I love. So I ain't that far off. ~ Eriq La Salle

If you take all the money we've spent at NASA since we landed on the moon and you had applied that money for incentives to the private sector, we would today probably have a permanent station on the moon, three or four permanent stations in space, a new generation of lift vehicles. ~ Newt Gingrich

I watched my head rolling on the floor. It landed face up and a big tear came out of one eye. ~ Shirley Maclaine

In one typical battalion, of forty-one officers who had landed on Sicily in July, only nine remained, and six of them had been wounded, according ~ Rick Atkinson

I still had moments when my nerves got to me, but whenever I'd start to get anxious, Kyla Ross would remind me, "Simone, just do what you do in practice." And before I went out for each event, she'd high-five me and say, "Just like practice, Simone!" I'd say the same thing to her when it was her turn to go up. "Just like practice" became our catchphrase.
As I walked onto the mat to do my floor exercise, I held on to that phrase like it was a lifeline, because I was about to perform a difficult move I'd come up with in practice - a double flip in the layout position with a half twist out. The way it happened was, I'd landed short on a double layout full out earlier that year during training, and I'd strained my calf muscle on the backward landing. Aimee didn't want me to risk a more severe injury, so she suggested I do the double layout - body straight with legs together and fully extended as I flipped twice in the air - then add a half twist at the end. That extra half twist meant I'd have to master a very tricky blind forward landing, but it would put less stress on my calves.
I thought the new combination sounded incredibly cool, so I started playing around with it until I was landing the skill 95 percent of the time. At the next Nationals Camp, I demonstrated the move for Martha and she thought it looked really good, so we went ahead and added it to the second tumbling pass of my floor routine. I'd already performed the combination at national meets that year, bu ~ Simone Biles

Kathel, you have the face of a scoundrel." Her eyes drifted slowly over his face and landed for a moment on his full lips. "With lips created for sin."
"Keirah," he whispered, gently squeezing her hands. "Talk like that is not helping matters. ~ Madison Thorne Grey

Gina hoisted herself up onto her elbows and gaped at Spike. "So that's the famous Spike I've been hearing so much about from your brothers? Damn, he is ugly."
Jesse, who'd stayed where he was, looked defensive. Spike was his baby, and you just don't go around calling Jesse's baby ugly.
"He's not so bad," I said, hoping Gina would get the message and shut up.
"Are you on crack?" Gina wanted to know. "Simon, the thing's only got one ear."
Suddenly, the large, gilt-framed mirror above the dressing table started to shake. It had a tendency to do this whenever Jesse got annoyed - really annoyed.
Gina, not knowing this, stared at the mirror with growing excitement. "Hey!" she cried. "All right! Another one!"
She meant an earthquake, of course, but this, like the one before, was no earthquake. It was just Jesse letting off steam.
Then the next thing I knew, a bottle of finger-nail polish Gina had left on the dressing table went flying and, defying all gravitational law, landed upside down in the suitcase she had placed on the floor at the end of the daybed, around seven or eight feet away.
I probably don't need to add that the bottle of polish - it was emerald green - was uncapped. And that it ended up on top of the clothes Gina hadn't unpacked yet.
Gina let out a terrified shriek, threw back the comforter, and dove to the floor, trying to salvage what she could. I, meanwhile, threw Jesse a very dirty look.
But all he said was, "Don' ~ Meg Cabot

But more important than any of these was the vast, accretive weight of small things, from planes which hadn't crashed to men and women who had come to the correct place at the perfect time and thus founded generations. He saw kisses exchanged in doorways and wallets returned and men who had come to a splitting of the way and had chosen the right fork. He saw a thousand random meetings that weren't random, ten thousand right decisions, a hundred thousand right answers, a million acts of unacknowledged kindness ... For every brick that landed on the ground instead of some little kid's head, for every tornado that missed the trailer park, for every missile that didn't fly, for every hand stayed from violence, there was the Tower. ~ Stephen King

I was 8 when we landed on the moon. I was so into the space program as a kid. Eventually, I realized it was very unlikely that a Mexican kid in the early '70s was going to be an astronaut. ~ Alfonso Cuaron

The mass of the population before the modern era rarely ate meat as the mass of the peasantry rarely do in underdeveloped countries today. In Europe, in the Middle Ages, meat, especially red meat, was associated with aristocracy, landed gentry and their militaristic and hunting culture. It was this, also, that tended to strengthen the association of meat with power and aggression. ~ Malcolm Hamilton

Let us waive that agitated national topic, as to whether such multitudes of foreign poor should be landed on our American shores;let us waive it, with the one only thought, that if they can get here, they have God's right to come. ~ Herman Melville

Glossie looked around at the houses. The snow was quite deep in that village, and just before them was a roof only a few feet above the sledge. A broad chimney, which seemed to Glossie big enough to admit Claus, was at the peak of the roof. "Why don't you climb down that chimney?" asked Glossie. Claus looked at it. "That would be easy enough if I were on top of the roof," he answered. "Then hold fast and we will take you there," said the deer, and they gave one bound to the roof and landed beside the big chimney. "Good!" cried Claus, well pleased, and he slung the pack of toys over his shoulder and got into the chimney. ~ L. Frank Baum

Ouch," Jace said in her ear, his tone indignant. "You elbowed me." "Well, you landed on me. ~ Cassandra Clare

Most people, it seems, think that Robinson Crusoe when he landed on his Island had nothing to keep him from starvation or anything else. As a matter of fact he had twelve raft loads of supplies that he took off the wrecked ship. He had as much food and furniture as if he had had a delicatessen store and Fifth Avenue outside his hut. ~ Will Cuppy

It almost looked like slow motion. The bag ripped and three pregnancy tests along with a pamphlet on safe sex and one on gonorrhea landed on the front seat with Holiday and Burnett.
Burnett looked down, gasped, and then looked up at Kylie. "For God's sake!" He muttered. ~ C.C. Hunter

We flew out of the city and we landed on the page where Moses split the sea and the Jews marched between those suspended mountains of water, hovering, humming on both sides, and the poor expelled merchants wondered if Moses knew what the fuck he was doing. What if his hand got tired and he accidentally dropped his magic cane, or got distracted by a wet desert ass, or lost his sandals, or what if that lush single malt of a God changed his mind again and the fucking Red Sea closed in on them with its menstrual red liquid? ~ Rawi Hage

Christopher Columbus was looking for a passage to India, but he landed in America. He landed in the wrong place, and when he got back, he wasn't sure where he'd been. But most important of all, he did it on someone else's money. ~ Ronald Reagan

I wanted to be a musician, either a guitarist or a drummer. I guess my dreams were in the entertainment industry, and I landed somewhere along there. ~ Israel Broussard

Her tongue flailed around all the questions stammering to get out, and she finally landed on: "When did you have time to take a mistress?"
His smile faltered. "Don't talk about Cress like that."
"What?"
"Oh - wait! You mean Darla. I won her in a hand of cards."
Cinder gawked.
"I thought she'd make a nice gift for Iko."
"You ... what?"
"For her replacement body?"
"Um."
"Because Darla's an escort-droid? ~ Marissa Meyer

It's nice to meet you, Evay.' I hold out my hand.
She just stares at it - like it's a spider crawling out of the shower drain. 'I don't make direct female-to-female contact. It depletes the beautification cells.'
O-kay. I glance at Billy. He seems unperturbed. I hook a thumb over my shoulder. 'So...do you guys want to eat? How about a booth?'
When Evay answers, her tone is airy, dazed, like a concussion victim. Or an acting coach - *be the tree.*
'I have my lunch right here.' She opens he realm to reveal an assortment of capsules that make my prenatals look like baby candy. 'But I need water. Do you have clear water from a snowy mountain spring?'
Wow.
Somebody call Will Smith - aliens really have landed.
'Uh...we don't get much snow around here, this time of year. We have Greenville's finest tap water, though.'
She shakes her head. And she still hasn't blinked. Not one freaking time.
'I only drink snowy mountain spring water. ~ Emma Chase

Henry O. Sturges, born in England, March 2nd, 1563. Landed at Roanoke, July 27th, 1587. Friend to the American Revolution, present at the Battles of Trenton and Yorktown, staunch supporter of the North in its hour of need, adviser to presidents, a decorated soldier who distinguished himself in the trenches of the Great War, and member of the Union Brotherhood - a collective of vampires dedicated to preserving the freedom of man and his dominion over the earth. ~ Seth Grahame-Smith

Paisley shivered. "So much for a relaxing stroll before dinner. Wait 'til I tell Gram about this. We've landed smack dab in the middle of the Scottish Twilight Zone. ~ Vonnie Davis

Do you remember the time we tied a lasso to a tree limb and decided to swing across the creek like Tarzan?" Wyatt tipped up his frosty bottle and took a long pull.
"Yeah." Zane was already laughing. "As usual,you two decided that I'd be the one to try it out first.That way,if it broke,I'd be the one tossed into the creek."
"It stands to reason." Jesse chuckled. "You were the youngest. That's just the price you had to pay to hang out with us."
"And," Wyatt added, "you were always willing to go along with whatever we decided."
Zane shook his head. "Not when I used it to fly across the creek."
"And not when I followed him," Wyatt said with a laugh. "But Jesse, assured that it was safe,grabbed hold and was flying through the air when the branch snapped."
Amy looked over at her husband. "You landed in the creek?"
"Yeah? On the day after one of our biggest storms,with the water spilling over its banks and rushing so fast it carried me downstream half a mile or more."
She put a hand to her mouth to cover her shock and saw Cora do the same.
Wyatt laughed. "He was lucky Zane and I had our horses tethered nearby.We chased along the banks of the creek until we could get far enough ahead to toss him a tree branch to catch. By the time we hauled him out,he looked like a drowned rat and was spitting mad."
"I had a right to be.I swallowed half the creek."
Zane laughed. "But think how lucky we were that it happened to you instead of me. ~ R.C. Ryan

Six out of seven times we landed successfully [on the Moon]. I wanted to be a part of that and I was a part of that, so my personal feeling is of great gratefulness for having somehow been in a position to have been given the opportunity to be on that first landing. That's a marvelous experience for a little kid that grew up in New Jersey. So I'm very thankful, and I asked the whole world to give thanks once we successfully landed. ~ Buzz Aldrin

I came into this environment where there was so much love, so much positive energy. I never heard my parents say, 'We have adopted kids.' The minute my sister Linda and I landed in Sweden, we were their kids. ~ Marcus Samuelsson

My travels have been numerous, though no topographer could chart the shores I have landed upon. For it is not places that have been my destination, but women. I am drawn to them by a force I have never questioned. To their infinite variety of charms I am helpless. But the hold of none has been strong enough to keep me from wandering aimlessly to others. ~ Roy L. Pickering Jr.

I was considered the luckiest of all the female gypsies since I landed the job as social secretary to Ambassador and Mrs. David Bruce at the American Embassy. ~ Letitia Baldrige

My intention all along had been to get my wakeboarding legs back this first day. Maybe I'd do tricks when we went out the next day. I didn't want to get too cocky and bust ass in front of Sean. But as I got more comfortable and forgot to care, I tried a few standbys-a front flip, a scarecrow. There was no busting of ass. So I tried a backroll. And landed it solidly.
Now I got cocky. I did a heelside backroll with a nosegrab. This meant that in the middle of the flip, I let go of the rope handle with one hand, reached down, and grabbed the front of the board. It served no purpose in the trick except to look impressive, like, This only appears to be a difficult trick. I have all the time in the world. I will grab the board. Yawn. And I landed it. This was getting too good to be true.
My brother swung the boat around just before we reached the graffiti-covered highway bridge that spanned the lake. Cameron had spray-painted his name and his girlfriend's name on the bridge, alongside all the other couples' names and over the faded ones. My genius brother had tried to paint his own name but ran out of room on that section of bridge.

McGULLICUDD
Y
Sean wisely never painted his girlfriends' names. He would have had to change them too often. For my part, I was very thankful that when most of this spray-painting action was going on last summer, I was still too short to reach over from the pile and haul myself up on the main part of the bridge. I probably ~ Jennifer Echols

This directing thing just sort of fell my way and landed in my lap. ~ Charles S. Dutton

It was the crossbows that decided Turkos, although his decision was almost too fast to be described as thought.
Even as they emerged from the shadow to gloat over their prisoners, he reared his horse - his precious horse, that he loved, Athena.
She reared obediently, and her broad stomach and long neck took all six of the crossbow bolts meant for him. And because she was all heart, she landed on four feet and continued forward after her iron-shod forefeet crushed the skulls of two warriors.
And then she fell. ~ Miles Cameron

I can't do this to you again," I whispered, lowering my eyes, so I didn't have to meet his.
"You can't do what again to me? Let me fall for you?" He exhaled sharply, keeping me close. "I fell for you forever ago and there's nothing you've done since that moment that has changed that. There's nothing you could do to change that. When a person falls, they don't just get up, dust themselves off, and keep going. If they fell right, if they fell good and hard the first time, there's no getting up from that fall because they landed right where they were supposed to be. ~ Nicole Williams

Another time, I was at the bar getting a drink and this geezer is stood at the bar with a ciggie in his mouth, trying his best to look rock hard. He takes a drag and points his finger in my face and drawls, 'Don't I know you?'
He was looking snake-eyed at me like a typical big screen gangster.
I stood in front of him and drawled back, 'I don't know, but they call me Richy Horsley,' and then bang, I batter him with a left hook that landed with a strange dull thud. Mr Movie Gangster was stood there leaning against the bar and staring out in to space, knocked out standing up. ~ Stephen Richards

Chapter One The weather in Paris was unusually warm as Peter Haskell's plane landed at Charles de Gaulle Airport. The plane taxied neatly to the gate, and a few minutes later, briefcase in hand, Peter was striding through the airport. He was almost smiling as he got on the customs line, despite the heat of the day and the number of people crowding ahead of him in line. Peter Haskell loved Paris. He generally traveled to Europe ~ Danielle Steel

Felicity looks like a girl whose lollipop has just landed in the dirt. ~ Anonymous

Zack stood, and Ace pulled him back to the bed. Zack landed with an oomph. "Sorry." Ace tried to be gentle as he pushed Zack to lie straight, the way he'd suggested. "What the fuck?" Zack's voice was muffled by the pillow Ace shoved under his face. "Just relax and enjoy. I'm not coming on to you, for Christ's sake. I'm just trying to be nice. Accept it," he barked, his glare fading when he felt Zack chuckle. "Ass." Zack sighed and settled into the bed.

-Ace & Zack ~ Marie Harte

I can't take the chance that she'll leave, and I feel that this moment is tentative, like a wild bird has just landed on my shoulder. ~ J. Lincoln Fenn

When his eyes landed on my mouth, I nearly swallowed my tongue. ~ Ginger Voight

Buzz Aldrin said something on the moon about a soft landing before 'stage-aware' Neil Armstrong said, "Houston, the Eagle has landed". People still argue about what the first words were on the moon. ~ Ray Palla

In America there are none poor, and none even that can be called peasants. Each citizen has some property, and all citizens have the same rights as the richest individual, or landed proprietor, in the country. ~ Marquis De Lafayette

A hand landed on Cress's head. She
gasped and recoiled, but Thorne was
already wrapping his arm around her
shoulders and squeezing her against him.
"Just checking it was you," he whispered. ~ Marissa Meyer

I know that. I just don't feel it sometimes. Over there I felt like I
hadn't a care in the world. Things felt so good and it was almost as
if every muscle in my body relaxed the moment I landed there. I
haven't laughed so much in years. I felt like a 23-year-old, Steph. I
haven't felt like that much lately. I know this probably sounds weird
but I felt like the me that I could have been.
I liked that I didn't have to look out for somebody else while I
walked down the street. I didn't have the fifty near heart attacks per
day that I usually get when Katie goes missing or puts something in
her mouth that she shouldn't. I didn't have to dive onto the road
and hold her back just in time from being hit by a car. I liked that I
didn't have to give out, correct people on their pronunciation or
make threats. I liked laughing at a joke without my sleeve being
tugged at and being asked to explain. I liked having adult conversations
without being interrupted to cheer and applaud a silly dance
or the learning of a new word. I liked that I was just me, Rosie, not
mummy, thinking just about me, talking about things I liked, going
places I liked to go without having to worry about nappy changes,
bottle feeding or sleepy-head tantrums. Isn't that awful? ~ Cecelia Ahern

The end of the world started when a Pegasus landed on the hood of my car. ~ Rick Riordan

The wind blew my words away from you. So while I told you I love you, the phrase was carried in the opposite direction and landed 333 miles away in the ears of a confused farmer. He was nice, though. He sent me a kind letter saying that while he was flattered, I wasn't really his type. ~ Jarod Kintz

Then like a bird, he gingerly landed on a protruding rock inside the monstrous cavern. I looked up at the wet walls teaming with sea life and reeled back feeling like I was going to lose my balance when I felt him reach around and carefully lift me off. He placed me so I could stand on the rock in front of him. His strong arms wrapped tightly around me so I wouldn't fall. We stood in astonishment deafened by the noise of the waves hitting the reef all around us. The warmth of his chest radiated against me. I molded my body up against his, my heart erupting in a flutter that caused my legs to weaken.
"What do you think?" he whispered into my ear. I felt his hot breath against the side of my neck, which caused me to be light-headed as my heart raced even harder.
"Awesome," I whispered, which was all I could get out as I slinked into his chest a little bit more. ~ Brenda Pandos

The results of the irrevocable decisions in her life, the commitments she had leaped into without thought, with only the sure and perfect knowledge that it mattered not where her feet landed because her heart was certain.
p 186 ~ Erica Bauermeister

Cassie fumbled helplessly beneath the shade of the ancient oak, still searching for her second shoe.The first had been easy to find, having landed close to where she had kicked it off; and when her hand had finally encountered it, she clutched it to her breast in a gesture of smug triumph. For one brief moment, she felt a twinge of sympathy for the sighted people who would never experience such sweet victory from a task as simple as finding a shoe. ~ Melinda Cross

It's a difficult path that we tread, us Indie self-publishers, but we're not alone. How many bands practicing in their dad's garage have heard of a group from the neighbourhood who got signed by a recording company? Or how many artists who love to paint, but are not really getting anywhere with it hear of someone they went to art school with being offered an exhibition in a gallery? How many chefs who love to get creative around food hear of someone else who's just landed a job with Marco Pierre White?
There's no difference between us and them. There is, however, a huge difference in how everyone else perceives the writer. And there's a huge difference between all of us – the writers, the musicians, the composers, the chefs, the dance choreographers and to a certain extent the tradesmen - and the rest of society in that no one understands us. It's a wretched dream to hope that our creativity gets recognised while our family thinks we're wasting our time when the lawn needs mowing, the deck needs painting and the bedroom needs decorating.
It's acceptable to go into the garage to tinker about with a motorbike, but it's a waste of a good Sunday afternoon if you go into the garage and practice your guitar, or sit in your study attempting to capture words that have been floating around your brain forever. ~ Karl Wiggins

Hey, think fast!'
I just looked at Fave as he chucked the basketball at me with possibly the worst overhand throw I'd ever seen. It landed to my far right, then bounced past me, banging against my dad's truck.
'Do you have a vision problem of something?' I asked him.
'Just keeping you on your toes,' he replied ~ Sarah Dessen

The desert was a school, a school where each day, each hour, a final examination was offered, where failure meant death and the buzzards landed to correct the papers. ~ Louis L'Amour

He turned down the street to Emilio's, trying to remember what "the edge of chaos" meant. It was something about flipping a coin, something about the edge being the moment when the coin was in the air. The point at which the system was pure potential, about to choose a path. Or something about a pile of sand, adding sand a grain at a time, and the edge of chaos being the point at which the critical grain landed and the pile either shifted or turned into an avalanche...
...Min bit her lip and smiled at him ruefully, and without another thought, he walked across the room to her, feeling almost relieved as the avalanche began. ~ Jennifer Crusie

He immediately went down with a thud and I was pretty certain most of the furniture in the room jumped when he landed. ~ Kristen Ashley

Fracture lines etch the surface of the glass box as if a body fell from the sky and landed on it. ~ Laurie Halse Anderson

AIDS had landed and I was terrified. I was very scared, just as everyone was in the '80s. It was really hard to be sexually active and to sleep with men and with women and not feel you had a responsibility in terms of having safe sex. ~ Michael Stipe

There's a legend that a very long time ago a meteorite fell from the sky and landed up in the mountains that surround this valley. ~ Jessica Sorensen

Last night we told you that none of the angels remember where we landed when we fell," Daniel said.
"Yeah, about that ... How's it possible?" Shelby said. "You'd think that kind of thing would leave an impression on the old memorizer."
Cam's face reddened. "You try falling for nine days through multiple dimensions and trillions of miles, landing on your face, breaking your wings, rolling around concussed for who knows how long, wandering the desert for decades looking for any clue as to who or what or where you are - then talk to me about the old memorizer. ~ Lauren Kate

There was a roar from the shadow-tiger mask around the Harley, and Murphy swept up alongside the boat. I leapt down onto the back of the bike in a single smooth motion, which I felt was cool, and landed with too much of my weight on my genitals, which I felt was not. ~ Jim Butcher

Sofia on the lost and found
But what's also amazing is how some of this stuff was ever lost in the first place. I mean, who "loses" their T-Shirt? Oops, my tee flew off my body and landed somewhere unknown. ~ Rose Cooper

Striding up to him, Wilhelm drew his fist back and landed a clean blow to Rupert's jaw. Rupert reeled, and after two wobbly backward steps, hit the floor on his backside. He raised a hand to his face. "Feel better?" "No. Get up so I can hit you again. ~ Melanie Dickerson

She had witnessed the world's most beautiful things, and allowed herself to grow old and unlovely. She had felt the heat of a leviathan's roar, and the warmth within a cat's paw. She had conversed with the wind and had wiped soldier's tears. She had made people see, she'd seen herself in the sea. Butterflies had landed on her wrists, she had planted trees. She had loved, and let love go. So she smiled. ~ Sonya Hartnett

Christ," Henry says, slapping at a bug that's landed on him, "what are these infernal creatures?"

"Mosquitoes," Alex supplies.

"They're awful," Henry says loftily. "I'm going to catch an exotic plague."

"I'm... sorry?"

"I just mean to say, you know, Philip is the heir and I'm the spare, and if that nervy bastard has a heart attack at thirty five and I've got malaria, whither the spare? ~ Casey McQuiston

But imagine this, for a moment. If an asteroid happened to hit one of the rare remaining older surfaces; if its strike were glancing enough that it didn't pulverise the surface, but forceful enough that it ejected a chunk of rock with an escape velocity of 12,000 mph; if that chunk, flung out into space, wandered aimlessly for a million years or two before feeling the gravitational tug of a nearby planet; if it tore through the atmosphere of that planet in a blaze of glory and landed on one of the planet's frozen ice caps; if the chunk was buried in snow, squeezed, shoved and harried until it re-emerged, blinking, into the strangely blue daylight; and if, tens of thousands of years later a few local bipeds happened upon it, might it contain signs of alien life? If so, it would surely become one of the most exciting pieces of real estate in the entire Solar System. ~ Gabrielle Walker

If I were anyone else ... your opera singer ... the woman across the hall ... would you have apologized?"
He looked confused. "No ... but you are neither of those women. You deserve better."
"Better," she repeated, frustrated. "That's just my point! You and the rest of society believe that it's better for me to be set upon a pedestal of primness and propriety - which might have been fine if a decade on that pedestal hadn't simply landed me on the shelf. Perhaps unmarried young women like our sisters should be there. But what of me?" Her voice dropped as she looked down at the cards in her hands. "I'm never going to get a chance to experience life from up there. All that is up there is dust and unwanted apologies. The same cage as hers" - she indicated the woman outside - "merely a different gilt. ~ Sarah MacLean

He slipped his hands around my waist and pulled me against him, tossing the ice cream cone over his shoulder. It landed with a splat on the sidewalk. "So does that mean I have a varsity girlfriend?"
I giggled like a total girl and linked my hands behind his neck. "Yeah I guess it does."
"Sweet." Then he bent his head, and I stood up on my tiptoes and we met in the middle. And it was perfect. ~ Stephie Davis

Now where's this artist?" His eyes darted around the room, landed on Gennie and clung. She thought she saw surprise, quickly veiled, then amusement as quickly suppressed, tug at the corners of his mouth.
"Daniel MacGregor," Grant said with wry formality. "Genvieve Grandeau."
A flicker of recognition ran across Daniel's face before he rose to his rather amazing height and held out his hand. "Welcome."
Gennie's hand was clasped, then enveloped. She had simultaneous impressions of strength, compassion, and stubbornness.
"You have a magnificent home, Mr. MacGregor," she said, studying him candidly. "It suits you."
He gave a great bellow of a laugh that might have shook the windows. "Aye.And three if your paintings hang in the west wing." His eyes slid briefly to Grant's before they came back to hers. "You carry your age well, lass."
She gave him a puzzled look as Grant choked over his Scotch. "Thank you."
"Get the artist a drink," he ordered, then gestured for her to sit in the chair next to his. "Now, tell me why you're wasting your time with a Campbell."
"Gennie happens to be a cousin of mine," Justin said mildly as he sat on the sofa beside his son. "On the aristocratic French side."
"A cousin." Daniel's eys sharpened, then an expression that could only be described as cunning pleasure spread over his face. "Aye,we like to keep things in the family. Grandeau-a good strong name.You've the look of a queen, with a bit of sorceress thro ~ Nora Roberts

Don't worry about me. I'll heal. Come on-"
"Where are we going?" Luce asked.
"The sun's about to rise," Daniel said, taking a small leather satchel from Phil. "And I figure you must be starving."
Luce hadn't realized it, but she was.
"I thought we could steal a moment before anyone else shows up."
There was a sheer, narrow path from the plateau that led to a small ledge down from where they'd landed. They picked their way down the jagged mountain, hand in hand, and when it was too steep for walking, Daniel coasted, always flying very low to the ground, his wings tucked close to his sides.
"Don't want to alarm the hikers," he explained. "Most places on Earth, people aren't willing to let themselves see miracles, angels. If they catch a glimpse of us flying by, they convince themselves their eyes were playing tricks on them. But in a place like this-"
"People can see miracles," Luce finished for him. "They want to."
"Right. And seeing leads to wonder."
"And wonder leads to-"
"Trouble." Daniel laughed a little.
Luce couldn't help grinning, enjoying that at least for a little while, Daniel was her miracle alone. ~ Lauren Kate

He couldn't be -

Oh, Lord. He was. He was going to kiss her.

"Wait." Panicked, Maddie put both hands on his chest, holding him off.

"Your men, my servants … they could be watching us."

"I'm certain they're watching us. That's why we're going to kiss."

"But I don't know how. You know I don't know how."

His lips quirked. "I know how."

Those three little words, spoken in that low, devastating Scottish burr, did absolutely nothing to ease Maddie's concerns.

Thankfully, she had a reprieve. He pulled back and peered at her hair. He looked like a boy marveling at clockwork, wondering how it all worked. After a few moments, she felt him grasp the pencil holding her chignon.
With one long, slow tug, he eased it loose and cast it aside.

It landed in the loch with a splash.

His fingers sifted through her hair, teasing the locks free of their haphazard knot and arranging them about her shoulders. Tenderly. Like she'd always imagined a lover would. Sparks of sensation danced from her scalp to her toes.

"That was my best drawing pencil," she said.

"It's just a pencil."

"It came from London. I have a limited supply."

His thumb caressed her cheek. "It almost put out my eye. I've a limited supply of those, too. And it's better this way."

"But - " Her breath caught. "Oh."

He bracketed her cheeks with his hands, til ~ Tessa Dare

Did you have any goal other than reaching the crash site?"

"You make it sound as though I conspired to get myself landed on the planet."

"And why would you do that?"

"That's my point. We wanted nothing more than to get out of there."

"Very well. What happened next? ~ Amie Kaufman

Go on," Kell told him without taking his eyes from Lila. " Get some rest."

Hastra shifted. "I can't, sir," he said. "I'm to escort Miss Bard--"

"I'll take that charge," cut in Kell. Hastra bit his lip and retreated several steps.

Lila let her forehead come to rest against his, her face so close the features blurred. And yet, that fractured eye shone with frightening clarity.

"You never told me," he whispered.

"You never noticed," she answered. And then, "Alucard did."

The blow landed, and Kell started to pull away when Lila's eyelids fluttered and she swayed dangerously.

He braced her. "Come on," he said gently. "I have a room upstairs. Why don't we--"

A sleepy flicker of amusement. "Trying to get me into bed?"

Kell mustered a smile. "It's only fair. I've spent enough time in yours."

"If I remember correctly," she said, her voice dreamy with fatigue, "you were on top of the bed the entire time."

"And tied to it," observed Kell.

Her words were soft at the edges. "Those were the days..." she said, right before she fell forward. It happened so fast Kell could do nothing but throw his arms around her.

"Lila?" he asked, first gently, and then more urgently. "Lila?"

She murmured against his front, something about sharp knives and soft corners, but didn't rouse, and Kell shot a glance at Hastra, who was still standing there, looki ~ V.E. Schwab

I know you are reading this poem which is not in your language
guessing at some words while others keep you reading
and I want to know which words they are.
I know you are reading this poem listening for something, torn between bitterness and hope
turning back once again to the task you cannot refuse.
I know you are reading this poem because there is nothing else left to read
there where you have landed, stripped as you are. ~ Adrienne Rich

Hope you got your things together.'" I sang, stabbing a pillow with my spear. Feathers exploded into the air. "'Hope you are quite prepared to die!'" I spun in a dazzling whirl of lights, landed a killer back-kick on a phantom Shade, and simultaneously punched the magazine rack. "'Looks like we're in for nasty weather!'" I took a swan dive at a short, imaginary Shade, lunged up at a taller one -
- and froze.
Barrons stood inside the front door, dripping cool-world elegance.
I hadn't heard him come in over the music. He was leaning, shoulder against the wall, arms folded, watching me.
"'One eye is taken for an eye . . .'" I trailed off, deflating. I didn't need a mirror to know how stupid I looked. I regarded him sourly for a moment, then moved for the sound dock to turn it off. When I heard a choked sound behind me I spun, and shot him a hostile glare. He wore his usual expression of arrogance and boredom. I resumed my path for the sound dock, and heard it again. This time when I turned back, the corners of his mouth were twitching. I stared at him until they stopped.
I'd reached the sound dock, and just turned it off, when he exploded.
I whirled. "I didn't look that funny," I snapped.
His shoulders shook.
"Oh, come on! Stop it!"
He cleared his throat and stopped laughing. Then his gaze took a quick dart upward, fixed on my blazing MacHalo, and he lost it again. I don't know, maybe it was the brackets sticking out from the sides. ~ Karen Marie Moning

A firefly landed on Honor's sleeve and began walking up her shoulder, its tail still blinking. As she craned her neck to look down at it, Jack chuckled. "Don't be scared. It's just a lightning bug." He placed his finger in its path. Honor tried not to think about the pressure of his touch. When the firefly crawled onto his finger, he lifted it up and let it fly off, signaling its escape route with sparks of light. ~ Tracy Chevalier

Someone else knows," I said. "The three most dangerous words in the secrecy business. But there it is. I know, and Ms. Nice knows. Which is why we came back with the RAF. Because where would your plane have landed? Guantanamo, maybe. But it didn't, and we're back in America, free and clear. And we know. I'm sure you could crush Ms. Nice's career, but you'll never find me. I'll always be out there. And you know me, General. You've known me a long time. I don't forgive, and I don't forget. And I won't have to do much. Talking might be enough. Suppose the SVR found out it was you who got Khenkin killed? Some of those IOUs might get canceled. And they might retaliate. Rumors might start, about poor old Tom O'Day, who got so desperate he came up with a cockamamie scheme. ~ Lee Child

Christ's death is the Christian's life. Christ's cross is the Christian's title to heaven. Christ "lifted up" and put to shame on Calvary is the ladder by which Christians "enter into the holiest," and are at length landed in glory. ~ J.C. Ryle

Ivypool backed away. She twisted and ducked under him as he leaped, but his claws sank into her tail and pinned her to the ground. Thistleclaw and Snowtuft attacked from opposite sides, snarling, slicing her ears. She struggled away from them, crashing into hard muscle. Hawkfrost was behind her now. He stabbed his claws into her shoulders. With a gasp, Ivypool saw his teeth flashing beside her throat. Then a black pelt flashed over the top of the gorse. Paws landed with a thump beside her.
"Get off her!" Hollyleaf yowled.
Ivypool's world spun as the black warrior slammed into Hawkfrost and sent him reeling into the gorse. Free from Hawkfrost's claws, Ivypool turned on Thistleclaw and Snowtuft. She began slashing with her front paws, remembering in a crystalline moment every moon of training. Hollyleaf reared up beside her, matching her blow for blow, as though she instinctively knew where Ivypool would strike next. Blood sprayed the forest floor as Ivypool sliced Snowtuft's muzzle and tore Thistleclaw's nose. Turning she kicked with hind legs and knocked Thistleclaw backward, then sank her teeth into Snowtuft's neck.
The white warrior screeched and ripped free from her jaws. Ivypool tasted his blood as he hared away through the bracken. She met Thistleclaw's gaze. Fear sparked in his eyes as she spat out a bloody clump of Snowtuft's fur.
"Run," she hissed. "Because if you stay, I will kill you".
Mouth open, Thistleclaw fled, disappearing through the ~ Erin Hunter

Just in front of her lay the Congaree Swamp National Forest. To prove it, a mosquito the size of a kitten landed on her arm and prepared to drill. ~ Sela Carsen

Michael sprang to his feet, then she gasped when he swung her up into his arms and whirled her in a circle. Her feet went flying out behind her and she clung to his neck as the yard spun around her. Michael kept spinning her in a circle as peals of laughter sounded from his strong throat. She was breathless by the time her feet landed on the ground, her head still whirling so badly she dared not let go of him lest she fall. ~ Elizabeth Camden

It was in the open market that we found Joe DiMaggio with the San Francisco Seals. A bad knee had scared everybody else off DiMaggio. But we risked $25,000 in cash and five players, and landed a star whom I would not sell for $250,000. ~ Jacob Ruppert

From Preach's time as a prison chaplain, before he joined the Atlanta PD, he knew the true horror of incarceration was not the loss of freedom, but the daily choices one was forced to make to survive. Navigating the jungle without becoming one of the animals. Most people that landed behind bars - not all, but most - had disadvantaged upbringings and poor choices to blame. It was prison that turned them into criminals. ~ Layton Green

He stood up, rushed to the fanned-out glossy company brochures. His finger landed on one in the center. Three stylized gold crowns. Corona Labs - BRINGING THE FUTURE TODAY.
"This," he said, finger tapping. Each time he touched the paper it seemed to get warmer.
This turned out to be the brochure for a new company.
Catherine picked it up, showed it to her husband. "I thought I knew more or less all the research labs in the country, but this is a new one." Mac turned the glossy paper over in his big hands. There was a videolette loop embedded in the paper, all the rage nowadays. Some smiling woman in a lab coat endlessly raising a test tube in triumph, putting it down, raising it . . .
Nick was shaking with tension. The logo, the name Corona Laboratories meant nothing to him, but still they shone in his mind. ~ Lisa Marie Rice

Dying feels like a familiar memory. Like a mental
imagery that is bone-deep, and somehow
melancholic. I am going to die. It is inevitable. It
is imminent. That is just the way the dice has
landed. ~ Nesrine BENAHMED

Lilies, I rule, heads, you do," he [the King] said, and threw the coin into the air.
"Lilies, you rule, heads, you throw again," said Attolia.
The coin dropped. Eugenides looked at it and then showed it to her. "No need," he said. The coin sat in his palm, obverse, showing the lilies of Attolia. He flipped it again and again and again. Each time it landed showing the lilies.
...
(Relius)
He wanted to dismiss the coin toss as slight of hand. Any circus performer could control the drop of a coin, but he'd been puzzled. The queen had been undismayed; she had seemed almost vindicated in her manner. It had been the King who was more disturbed with each toss of the coin. He'd looked almost sick, Relius thought, by the time he put the coin away.
...
Walking away along the arcade that lay perpendicular to the one where Relius lurked, the king pulled the coin from his pocket. He looked at the gold stater in sudden disgust and pitched it hard between the columns of the arcade into the shrubbery. ~ Megan Whalen Turner

I shouldn't be jealous because it's not real
she's like a math problem, the kind where you got the right answer but didn't show any of your work. She is the right answer, but she didn't get there by going through anything difficult, by questioning, by doubting. She landed there by playing a part, but she's never done the work.
I'm still jealous. ~ Jackson Pearce

He hadn't landed on the battlefield to save Christina, at least not entirely. He'd landed there because it was meant to be – because his destiny lay with a bonny woman who would capture his heart and show him honor and respect on a uniquely deep level that had been lost in the twenty-first century. ~ Amy Jarecki

In a sec.......let's see if this will help. Once there was a bunny that was very sad
cause his ears were long and floppy and he stepped on them all the time."
"Like my shoelaces?"
"Yep, just like that. One day a beautiful fairy,,,,,,,,"
"The shoelace fairy?"
"Yep. She landed on the bunny's head and.........."
"Didn't that hurt? Does she have a wand?"
"Nope. She lifted up the bunny's ears and crossed them over like an x."
"I can cross my eyes.........look."
"Lovely. She put one ear through the bottom of the x and she pulled."
"She pulled the bunny's ears..........bad fairy."
"No, she was trying to tie his.........."
"Dan," Jordan laughed, "Stop. That is the worst thing I've ever heard."
"Well, it's better than the teepees and the arrows and crap," Danny huffed.
"Can I go see Andy now?"
"Yes, go see Andy and his Velcro sneakers," Jordan snickered. "We give up. ~ Grasshopper

At the tender age of 19 Bessie Stringfield commenced traveling across the United States. She'd toss a penny onto a map of the States and wherever it landed was where she'd go, and this was at the height of racism at its ugliest, yet this never stopped her. Though often denied accommodation because of the colour of her skin, she would find a place to sleep with black families or, if this wasn't possible, she'd simply sleep on her motorbike at filling stations, using her rolled up jacket as a pillow ~ Karl Wiggins

And you just now say something?" Tink vaulted over the couch. Like, jumped up and cleared the back and landed, standing on the center cushion.

I gaped at him. "How in the world did your towel stay on for that when I can't even get one to stay wrapped around me when I get out of the shower?"

"Magic," he replied. "Seriously. ~ Jennifer L. Armentrout

As someone who flew two space capsules and twice landed in the ocean, I can attest from personal experience how much logistics work is needed to get you home. ~ Buzz Aldrin

We shouldn't be here at all, if we'd known more about it before we started. But I suppose it's often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of a sport, as you might say. But that's not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually - their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn't. And if they had, we shouldn't know, because they'd have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on - and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same - like old Mr Bilbo. But those aren't always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we've fallen into? ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

The ones that landed near the bathroom are Bad Tolkien imitations or transcripts of a D&D adventure; bad Herbert, Heinlein, and Asimov are below the television; and these on the bed are the ones whose authors I want to hunt down personally and slap. ~ Sharyn McCrumb

Marlboro Man opened the passenger door of the semi and allowed me to climb out in front of him, while Tim exited the driver-side door to see us off. That wasn't so bad, I thought as I made my way down the steps. Aside from the manicure remark and my sweating problem, meeting Marlboro Man's brother had gone remarkably well. I looked okay that evening, had managed a couple of witty remarks, and had worn just the right clothing to conceal my nervousness. Life was good.
Then, because the Gods of Embarrassment seemed hell-bent on making me look bad, I lost my balance on the last step, hooking the heel of my stupid black boots on the grate of the step and awkwardly grabbing the handlebar to save myself from falling to my death onto the gravel driveway below. But though I stopped myself from wiping out, my purse flew off my arm and landed, facedown, on Tim's driveway, violently spilling its contents all over the gravel.
Only a woman can know the dreaded feeling of spilling her purse in the company of men. Suddenly my soul was everywhere, laid bare for Marlboro Man and his brother to see: year-old lip gloss, a leaky pen, wadded gum wrappers, and a hairbrush loaded up with hundreds, if not thousands, of my stringy auburn hairs. And men don't understand wads of long hair--for all they knew, I had some kind of follicular disorder and was going bald. There were no feminine products, but there was a package of dental floss, with a messy, eight-inch piece dangling from the openin ~ Ree Drummond

We want a few mad people now. See where the sane ones have landed us! ~ George Bernard Shaw

I knew what I was getting into: 72-ounce steaks, shakes by the quart, atomic wings. When I landed 'Man v. Food' in 2008, I accepted the fact that my weight would fluctuate. But instead of stressing about the scale, I made my long-term health a primary concern. ~ Adam Richman

Yep. A box of dicks, if you will. Actually, that's how I got fired."
"What do you mean?"
"I screwed up and had my prototypes sent to my office. The boxes got piled up outside my cube, and a coworker of mine decided she had to know what was in them, so she opened one. Apparently she wasn't used to being wrist-deep in dicks because she freaked and dropped one on the floor, which of course turned on and vibrated its way just far enough into the hall for a senior VP to trip on. He landed face-first on the floor, broke a wrist and chipped a tooth, and I had to explain that my dick was the culprit. ~ Meghan March

I'm sorry, Percy. I didn't mean to ... I always mess things up. It was kind of hard to argue with her, though I was glad she was safe. I looked in the direction Annabeth had gone, but she'd disappeared into the crowd. I couldn't believe what she'd just done - saved Rachel's life, landed a helicopter, and walked away like it was no big deal. ~ Rick Riordan

I landed in London on a wintry autumn evening. It was dark and raining, and I saw more fog and mud in a minute than I had seen in a year. I walked from the Custom House to the Monument before I found a coach; and although the very house-fronts, looking on the swollen gutters, were like old friends to me, I could not but admit that they were very dingy friends. ~ Charles Dickens