The Last Days of Ava Langdon Quotes

“She follows her nose and stands once more before the doors of a quintessential dilemma. Male or Female. Here is her paradox. A staccato voice seems to challenge her, berate her. Hombre or Mujer. Mann or Frau. Homme or Femme. Gentleman or Lady. Com on, decide. She knows them all. She is them all. Not fluid or all-encompassing, gathering the harvest of the reaping fields, but fractured and split and bleeding. Her inner core weeping out of itself. There is nothing for hermaphrodites. It's too confusing. The words rattle around in her earbones, androgynous and humming. How can she choose? She cannot choose. To choose is to sunder.”
― Mark O'Flynn, The Last Days of Ava Langdon

“She indicates the grave that Ava adorns like something from the Weimar Republic. Ava jumps up (ouch) and they both examine the inscription on the stone.
'Very poetic,' says Ava.
'Denise, my daughter, chose it.'
'I am so dreadfully sorry.'
'That's all right.' Poppy passes a finger under her eye. 'I don't think he would have minded.'
'No, I mean the metre is awful. Who makes up this stuff? Where's the Miss you, old trooper, where's the Ride on, stranger? It's all lambs' tails and fingerprints of the everlasting.'
'Pardon?'
'Never mind. Just thinking out loud...”
― Mark O'Flynn, The Last Days of Ava Langdon

“Along the corridors there are pictures, old photographs of doctors and high-faluting administrators, scowling down as if scowling down was some sort of heritage. One of them is a dour fellow with a fine moustache, looking off into the distance. What she would give to be able to grow a moustache like that.”
― Mark O'Flynn, The Last Days of Ava Langdon

“Tell me, have you been blessed, and I use the term advisedly, with progeny?'
'Children?'
'Yes.'
'I have-'
'Don't. At our age they're not worth it.'
'I-'
'I'm talking from experience.'
'I don't doubt it,' says Poppy.
'Stone foetuses, all of them.'
And Poppy, astonished, seems to know what this strange woman is talking about. It's what she has too. A fossil of grief that will never go away.
Yes, thinks Ava in return, she knows what I'm on about. We can read each other's mind.”
― Mark O'Flynn, The Last Days of Ava Langdon

“In the general fiction section Ava discovered a well-thumbed edition of the latest bestseller. One million copies sold! Pah again! She cracked the book open at the spine, knew just where the join was weakest. She laid it open like a sacrificial goat on the carped, hidden between the shelves of books. Then she unleashed her machete, samurai-warrior style, and raising it above her head brought it down, and cleaved the book in twain, splitting it down the middle like a coconut. And that was when, seeing the scimitar rise again, the librarian screamed.”
― Mark O'Flynn, The Last Days of Ava Langdon

“She tops up the silver pot with the hot water, steeping every sixpence's worth of tannin out of those tea leaves floating in the water like bloated ants. Do ants bloat? She has to say she has never seen a bloated ant. The injustice of it.”
― Mark O'Flynn, The Last Days of Ava Langdon

“Ava realises she has no idea what a mother might think if you took to her child with a machete, irrespective of the moral righteousness of it. Surely as a writer she should have a greater understanding of what goes on in the minds of others. She must try harder.”
― Mark O'Flynn, The Last Days of Ava Langdon