1646 ratings (3.63 avg)
98 reviews
Goodreads librarian
more photos (2)

A.J. Howard

https://www.goodreads.com/ajhoward

A.J.’s Bookshelves

to-read‎ (3)
currently-reading‎ (1)
read‎ (1650)
shelved-for-now‎ (1)
bookshelf-fiction‎ (629)
history‎ (537)
sff‎ (296)
1001-books‎ (290)
historical-fiction‎ (177)
guardian-1000‎ (171)
biography‎ (149)
finished-in-2021‎ (144)

finished-in-2011‎ (123)
finished-in-2020‎ (118)
finished-in-2018‎ (117)
bancroft-wolfson-parkman-pulitzer‎ (116)
finished-in-2010‎ (105)
electioneering‎ (104)
finished-in-2019‎ (101)
thrillers-etc‎ (101)
finished-in-2017‎ (100)
finished-in-2024‎ (99)
time-100‎ (91)
finished-in-2022‎ (84)

finished-in-2023‎ (81)
short-stories‎ (77)
modern-library-100-novels‎ (74)
finished-in-2014‎ (73)
nobel‎ (70)
sports‎ (70)
cultural-currency‎ (69)
finished-in-2013‎ (65)
finished-in-2012‎ (63)
finished-in-2015‎ (58)
finished-in-2016‎ (57)
picture-books‎ (57)

music‎ (49)
six-stars‎ (48)
read-more-than-once‎ (45)
essays‎ (44)
saturday-nights-and-sunday-mornings‎ (43)
finished-in-2009‎ (33)
modern-library-100-nonfiction‎ (31)
science‎ (20)
nixanigans‎ (19)
guilty-disappointments‎ (12)

Stats | More…

A.J. is Currently Reading

A.J. Howard is currently reading

The Promise

by Damon Galgut

bookshelves: currently-reading

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Nov 04, 2024 03:03PM

A.J.’s Quotes

“He had learned the worst lesson that life can teach - that it makes no sense.”
― Philip Roth, American Pastoral

342 likes

“I have never seen much point in getting heavy with stupid people or Jesus freaks, just as long as they don't bother me. In a world as weird and cruel as this one we have made for ourselves, I figure anybody who can find peace and personal happiness without ripping off somebody else deserves to be left alone. They will not inherit the earth, but then neither will I... And I have learned to live, as it were, with the idea that I will never find peace and happiness, either. But as long as I know there's a pretty good chance I can get my hands on either one of them every once in a while, I do the best I can between high spots.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time

254 likes

“We never learn anything, never in the world, and in spite of all the history books written. They’re just the way we plead or ague with ourselves about it, but it’s only light from the outside that we’re supposed to take inside. If we can. There’s a regular warehouse of fine suggestions and if we’re not better it isn’t because there aren’t plenty of marvelous and true ideas to draw on, but because our vanity weighs more than all of them put together.”
― Saul Bellow, The Adventures of Augie March

9 likes

“Tell me this, pal, why isn't everybody sitting on a fence in the moonlight playing a banjo? That's all I want to know.”
― Vincent Lawrence

4 likes

“It’s quite a task to combat the absolutists and the relativists at the same time: to maintain that there is no totalitarian solution while also insisting that, yes, we on our side also have unalterable convictions and are willing to fight for them. After various past allegiances, I have come to believe that Karl Marx was rightist of all when he recommended continual doubt and self-criticism. Member in the skeptical faction or tendency is not at all a soft option. The defense of science and reason is the great imperative of our time… To be an unbeliever is not merely to be “open-minded.” It is, rather, a decisive admission of uncertainty that is dialectically connected to the repudiation of the totalitarian principle, in the mind as well as in politics. But that’s my Hitch-22. I have already described some of my rehearsals for this war… and for the remainder of my days I shall be happy enough to see if I can emulate the understatement of Commander Hitchens, and to say that at least I know what I am supposed to be doing.”
― Christopher Hitchens, Hitch 22: A Memoir

16 likes

More of A.J.’s quotes…