I’m making myself read new books this summer, not just re-reading The Hobbit and Dune and other things on my shelf. I started with Crossing to Safety, in which I noticed uncomfortable similarities between the bossy wife and myself, and found this quote. [Set up: It’s about two couples. One of the couples is rich and has this fancy old touring car, a Marmon.]:
Looking in under the propped hood, I could see that the engine was not twelve in line, as I had always half believed, but a V-16. It would have pulled a fire truck. At every stroke a stream of gasoline as thick as my finger must be pulsing through the carburetor. She panted at us in the whiskey-and-emphysema whisper of an Edith Wharton dowager. “Dollar-dollar-dollar-dollar-
That quote is probably the funniest part of the book, which deals with polio, thwarted ambition, stomach cancer, etc., but I do recommend it. I think it’s something I’ll have to revisit in the future. Because re-reading is really where it’s at.
That is a very nice quote and a very nice car.
🙂
I’ve liked all of his fiction, but I can see how it will resonate more the older (and the more involved inadult relationships) I get. Yay for re-reading every decade!
I took a Stegner class back in my college days and recall really liking this novel, along with Recapitulation. I can’t recall much about either, beyond enjoying them, so I guess a re-read is in order for me as well!