When it comes to letting the world in on the secrets of his heart, he has about as much shrinking reticence as a steam calliope.

I don't want to wrong anybody, so I won't go so far as to say that she actually wrote poetry, but her conversation, to my mind, was of a nature calculated to excite the liveliest of suspicions. Well, I mean to say, when a girl suddenly asks you out of a blue sky if you don't sometimes feel that the stars are God's daisy-chain, you begin to think a bit.

Rex Stout's narrative and dialogue could not be improved, and he passes the supreme test of being rereadable. I don't know how many times I have reread the Wolfe stories, but plenty. I know exactly what is coming and how it is all going to end, but it doesn't matter. That's writing.

In every romance you have to budget for the occasional dust-up.

As for Gussie Finknottle, many an experienced undertaker would have been deceived by his appearance and started embalming on sight.

It was one of the most disgusting spectacles I've ever seen-- this white-haired old man, who should have been thinking of the hereafter, standing there lying like an actor.

Statisticians estimate that crime among good golfers is lower than in any class of the community except possibly bishops.