To an God Unknown by John Steinbeck

Three weeks before Thanksgiving the evenings were red on the mountaintops toward the sea, and the bristling, officious wind raked the valley and sang around the house corners at night and flapped the window shades, and the little whirlwinds took columns of dust and leaves down the road like reeling soldiers.

Every night the sky burned over the sea and the clouds massed and deployed, charged and retreated in practice for the winter.

The Pastures of Heaven by John Steinbeck

Poverty sat cross-legged on the farm, and the Maltbys were ragged.

In a tall wild pear tree a congress of bluejays squawked a cacphonous argument.

"How run-down and slovenly," she thought. "How utterly lovely and slipshod."

Among the branches of the trees a tiny white fragment of mist appeared and delicately floated along just over the treetops. In a moment another translucent shred joined it, and another and another. They sailed along like a half-materialized ghost, growing larger and larger until suddenly they struck a column of warm air and rose into the sky to become little clouds.

The Trumpeter by Eric P. Kelly

I just discovered this 1928 Newberry Award winning book. What a jewel! Well-written and full of information about 15th century Krakow. I loved the following paragraph:

Not until then did he seek comfort and counself from his wife, who had always been his solace at such times; throwing himself down beside her on the wagon seat, he told her the story of his late discoveries, the absence of the king, the death of his kinsman. For a second the woman's heart quailed before the fresh difficulties, but she forgot self at the look in her husband's face. Her quiet reply, "We will wait, for God is in the waiting."

A Corpse in the Koryo by James Church

I find that I love writers who use a lot of anthropomorphism in their writing. Here's a great example:

Small clouds nuzzled outcroppings along the hilltops, baby white puffs that looked like they had needed something solid to lean against during the night. They had overslept and been left behind. As I watched, they grew more transparent with each sunbeam that touched them. No struggle or sound of despair. They just disappeared.

Cold Shoulder Road by Joan Aiken

The sun on their right was like a silver penny, faint in the mist.

Like Water in Wild Places by Pamela Jooste

Adult book. Kind of magical realism. I loved this passage because often we need to develop eyes to see the beauty in a place.

The farm is called Liefdefontein. Fountain of Love. It stands in the drylands that run close to the border of Namibia. If you don't havve eyes that see, the land looks like nothing. It looks as if its soul has been snatched away from it.

It's flatscape, and sometimes there are small hills and gullies that trap the afternoon shadows and are ice-cold at night. Even in summer, when the rain sings down, the grass clings tight to the ground in small khaki tufts.

Winter, when the frost comes and the ground is bare and the trees pared down, is a the time to hunt. Then the game run looking for water and the landscape is pale and clear. The sun is sharp and you can see for a very long way. Even without telescopic sights, all moving things are easier to see and to track and to hunt down.

Me and Orson Welles by Robert Kaplow

I showered and got dressed with my eyes closed to see what it felt like to be blind. [I thought I was the only person who did this!]