Books like A Man in Full

Even on the radar it displayed its silent speed, more than two thousand miles an hour. It would not be heard at this station until some moments after it had passed. Then sonic booms would thunder through the air, reassuring the listeners that this bomb at least had passed them by. “If you hear it,” the sergeant explained to Mott, “it’s already gone.”

There was a picture of the family over the mantelpiece, removed thither from the front room after Mrs. Osborne’s death—George was on a pony, the elder sister holding him up a bunch of flowers; the younger led by her mother’s hand; all with red cheeks and large red mouths, simpering on each other in the approved family-portrait manner. The mother lay underground now, long since forgotten—the sisters and brother had a hundred different interests of their own, and, familiar still, were utterly estranged from each other. Some few score of years afterwards, when all the parties represented are grown old, what bitter satire there is in those flaunting childish family-portraits, with their farce of sentiment and smiling lies, and innocence so self-conscious and self-satisfied. Osborne’s own state portrait, with that of his great silver inkstand and armchair, had taken the place of honour in the dining-room, vacated by the family-piece.

A voice in my head, echoing softly: America hates angry women. The Lord hates angry women. You hate angry women. Do not be an angry woman.

Knock-knock-knockNo, that’s not creepy at all. Being in a spaceship twelve light-years from home and having someone knock on the door is totally normal.

In 1902 Father built a house at the crest of the Broadview Avenue hill in New Rochelle, New York. It was a three-story brown shingle with dormers, bay windows and a screened porch. Striped awnings shaded the windows. The family took possession of this stout manse on a sunny day in June and it seemed for some years thereafter that all their days would be warm and fair. The best part of Father’s income was derived from the manufacture of flags and buntings and other accoutrements of patriotism, including fireworks. Patriotism was a reliable sentiment in the early 1900’s. Teddy Roosevelt was President. The population customarily gathered in great numbers either out of doors for parades, public concerts, fish fries, political picnics, social outings, or indoors in meeting halls, vaudeville theatres, operas, ballrooms. There seemed to be no entertainment that did not involve great swarms of people.

As I approached my fiftieth birthday, I had become more and more enraged and mystified by the idiot decisions made by my countrymen. And then I had come suddenly to pity them, for I understood how innocent and natural it was for them to behave so abominably, and with such abominable results: They were doing their best to live like people invented in story books. This was the reason Americans shot each other so often: It was a convenient literary device for ending short stories and books.Why were so many Americans treated by their government as though their lives were as disposable as paper facial tissues?