Quotes from The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break

Steven Sherrill ·  313 pages

Rating: (2.9K votes)


“There, in the horseshoe drive, Kelly, gullible and mortal Kelly, awaits an explanation from a bedraggled immortal. The Minotaur accepts this temporary blessing for all it is worth. There are few things that he knows, these among them: that is is inevitable, even necessary, for a creature half man and half bull to walk the face of the earth; that in the numbing span of eternity even the most monstrous among us needs love; that the minutiae of life sometimes defer to folly; that even in the most tedious unending life there comes, occasionally, hope. One simply has to wait and be ready.”
― Steven Sherrill, quote from The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break


“Standing at the window, reading the menu of Obediah's services, the Minotaur wishes he could believe in what she has to offer: a promise woven into deep lines of his palm, some turn of fate told by a card. But faith is a nebulous thing and charlatans a dime a dozen; it's always been that way. The Minotaur both envies and pities the devout.”
― Steven Sherrill, quote from The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break


“The architecture of the Minotaur’s heart is ancient. Rough hewn and many chambered, his heart is a plodding laborious thing, built for churning through the millennia. But the blood it pumps—the blood it has pumped for five thousand years, the blood it will pump for the rest of his life—is nearly human blood. It carries with it, through his monster’s veins, the weighty, necessary, terrible stuff of human existence: fear, wonder, hope, wickedness, love. But in the Minotaur’s world it is far easier to kill and devour seven virgins year after year, their rattling bones rising at his feet like a sea of cracked ice, than to accept tenderness and return it.”
― Steven Sherrill, quote from The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break


“Cecie keeps telling him she’d like to take him home some night, husband or no. The Minotaur waits hopefully. Husband or no.”
― Steven Sherrill, quote from The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break


“Pity the child for his loss. He truly wanted his laser gun to kill the Minotaur, believed that it would, even. Each time an act of hope fails, the capacity for experiencing hope itself diminishes. The child will be lucky if he reaches adulthood with even a shred of faith intact.”
― Steven Sherrill, quote from The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break



About the author

Steven Sherrill
Born place: in Mooresville, NC, The United States
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Maybe it's true that shared trauma brings people closer together-a common hardship, a battle to survive-because when times are quiet people relax and go their own separate ways. They're lulled into believing they've got everything under control and don't need what they did before.”
― Laura Wiess, quote from Leftovers


“Welcome to the gates of heaven Adelia, and what did you do with your life? My Lord, I was a bishop's whore.”
― Ariana Franklin, quote from Mistress of the Art of Death


“Don't get me wrong—he's hot as hell, and in another life I would have liked to wear him as a mink coat. But when your first thought about someone is wondering whether they're some sort of handsome woodland serial killer, it's hard to build an attraction.”
― Karsten Knight, quote from Wildefire


“All of these concrete metaphors increase enormously our powers of perception of the world about us and our understanding of it, and literally create new objects. Indeed, language is an organ of perception, not simply a means of communication.”
― Julian Jaynes, quote from The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind


“I guess when you love someone, you don't mind making sacrifices.”
― Shannon Messenger, quote from Let the Storm Break


Interesting books

Back to You
(15.5K)
Back to You
by Priscilla Glenn
Claimed
(6.7K)
Claimed
by Rebecca Zanetti
Unbeautifully
(29.7K)
Pavilion of Women: A Novel of Life in the Women's Quarters
(10.2K)
Pavilion of Women: A...
by Pearl S. Buck
The Journeys of Socrates
(2.5K)
The Journeys of Socr...
by Dan Millman
In One Person
(22.4K)
In One Person
by John Irving

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.