January 27, 2015

Cocktail Talk: All Shot Up

all-shot-upI’ve talked a pretty fair amount about my love of the writer Chester Himes, and pretty much everything he’s written. And have had a number of quotes from books of his featuring the Harlem detectives Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson. But I’ve never had a quote from the book All Shot Up? That seems almost unbelievable. But I’m here to rectify that (and might have more quotes from this book in the future, cause it is awesome) with the below from the very first page of the book.

His eyes popped. He knew he was sober. He hadn’t been drinking any whisky and he hadn’t been smoking any weed. But he didn’t believe what he saw. It was a mirage; but this was not the desert and he was not dying of thirst. In fact he was cold enough for his guts to freeze; and the only thing he wanted to drink was a hot rum and lemon.

He saw a Cadillac pass, the likes of which he had never seen. And his business was cars.

This Cadillac looked as though it were made of solid gold.

–Chester Himes, All Shot Up

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