Katie Coyle

Vivian Apple at the End of the World (2013)

The British first edition was titled Vivian Versus the Apocalypse. All page numbers here are from the hardcover first American edition, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, ISBN 978-0-544-34011-4, first printing

Italics as in the book

• What Harp doesn’t understand is that I like my parents—current hiccups in sanity not withstanding.
  • Chapter 1 (p. 4)

• “I’m Harp,” my best friend says, business-like. “This is Viv. Personally, I think you guys would make really cute babies together.”
  • Chapter 1 (p. 6)

• “That’s part of the prophecy of the Rapture, right? The dead will rise and crash our parties?”
  He laughs. “Do you really think that’s a priority, for the reanimated corpses?”
  “Absolutely,” I say. “No French onion dip in purgatory.”
  • Chapter 1 (p. 7)

• “I mean, these people really believe what they believe.”
  “But what they believe is so absurd.”
  • Chapter 1 (pp. 8-9)

• In addition to founding the Church itself, Frick was the CEO of its accompanying multimillion-dollar corporation. They publish the magazines and run the Church television networks, and they produce end-of-the-world provisions like these—bottles of Holy Spring Water, a bland SpaghettiOs knockoff called Christ Loops.
  • Chapter 2 (p. 21)

• Even now I think I could only list for him the various things I don’t believe in. But still I wish I could. Because I’m starting to narrow it down. I don’t believe in hate. I don’t believe in money. I don’t believe in God. I don’t believe it’s too late.
  • Chapter 5 (p. 59)

• “This whole country,” says my grandmother evenly, “supports a culture of ignorance and anti-intellectualism which posits that not understanding a phenomenon is just as valid as understanding one, and frankly I’m sick of it.”
  • Chapter 6 (p. 64)

• “But it was probably nothing.”
  “Nothing is nothing anymore, Viv.”
  • Chapter 8 (p. 84)

• (“For God saw that Americans were industrious and made money in His name, and he saw that it was good”). It’s one of the many parts of the Book of Frick that makes you wonder whether or not Frick was just straight-up on ’shrooms when he was writing it.
  • Chapter 8 (p. 93)

• Believer culture seems to shift so quickly, from benign to terrifying and back again.
  • Chapter 10 (p. 112)

• It’s funny now to think that we were ever confused by extreme action taken in the name of God.
  • Chapter 10 (p. 114)

• Behind him shines the blinking neon of a casino: sinners—if you’re going to hell, don’t go broke.
  • Chapter 16 (p. 180)

• But I can’t justify the act to myself, no matter how much I like making out with the boy I’d be trying to save. That would be playing by Believer rules—telling myself that violence and the threat of it is okay, if that’s what it takes to get you what you want. “For God so loved the world,” says the Book of Frick, “that he sent us guns with which to protect our homes and women.”
  • Chapter 16 (p. 188)

• I wonder if this is what bravery is: adrenaline plus love plus absolute stupidity.
  • Chapter 16 (p. 188)

• I’ve always believed Frick to be detached from reality, but I thought he was just a megalomaniac, a manipulator, a con artist. Now I begin to slowly understand. He’s far more dangerous than any of those things. He’s a true Believer.
  • Chapter 19 (pp. 221-222)

Vivian Apple Needs a Miracle (2014)

The British first edition was titled Vivian Versus America. All page numbers here are from the hardcover first American edition, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, ISBN 978-0-544-39042-3, first printing

• “What? Why the fuck are you smiling?”
  “Because you’re so like Winnie, it’s actually spooky. You both clearly possess the take-no-shit gene.”
  • Chapter 3 (p. 31)

• We could conceivably slow this destruction down, but it would require huge overarching changes in the structure of our society—the kind of change we will never achieve so long as we remain distracted by imaginary acts of God.
  • Chapter 6 (p. 70)

• I’m starting to understand how little purchase the truth actually affords us in this world.
  • Chapter 6 (p. 71)

• I will never understand why Believers cling to this kind of language, this relentless empty optimism, plus all! those! exclamation! points!
  • Chapter 9 (p. 113)

• Harp gives me a look.
  “What?”
  “You are terrible at lying, Viv. Embarrassingly bad. Have I taught you nothing?”
  • Chapter 9 (p. 115)

• Everyone seems absurdly rich and very drunk. I notice with annoyance that there’s no adherence to modesty here: I see short skirts and plenty of cleavage, bare necks adorned by jewels. I guess if you have enough money, the Church will overlook a selection of your sins.
  • Chapter 14 (p. 177)

• How many simple pleasures I denied myself, because I thought that’s what goodness was. How stupid that it took me until the end of the world to realize it was something else entirely.
  • Chapter 14 (p. 180)

• If I ever had patience for believers who wanted to convince me of my own wickedness, I’ve officially run out of it.
  • Chapter 19 (p. 247)

• It’s not enough for the Believers to feel abandoned—they need to know they’ve been lied to. Otherwise someone down the line will try again.
  • Chapter 22 (p. 284)

• “Bless him”—the Messiah raises a shiny copy of the New Apocalypse Edition of the Book of Frick—“for leaving us this miraculous book, this new edition of his Holy Word, available for only nineteen ninety-nine at Church of America megastores worldwide.”
  • Chapter 22 (p. 287)

• If there are any doctors in the house, could we get Mr. Masterson some medical attention? It would be a shame if he were to pass away before he’s prosecuted for his crimes.
  • Chapter 22 (p. 291)