Mrs. Dalloway

Mrs. Dalloway is no usual novel. It gets you into the head of people associated with Mrs. Dalloway's upcoming party. All takes place in one day, and it's just a captivating read. Woolf takes you deep into her characters, and she's brilliant with the way she deals with them, and gets you into their inner thoughts. It's a really good book.
I'm definitely a fan of Virgina Woolf, this is my second book for her, my first was Orlando. The way she writes is what got me into the book. It's just so good! You may love Woolf, and you may hate her works but you'll have to admit at the end of the day that she writes so well and I find myself amazed at how often I can relate with what she's writing about.

Here are a few quotes I found myself pondering upon in the novel:
"Did it matter then, she asked herself, walking towards Bond Street, did it matter that she must inevitably cease completely; all this must go on without her; did she resent it; or did it not become consoling to believe that death ended absolutely? but that somehow in the streets of London, on the ebb and flow of things, here, there, she survived, Peter survived, lived in each other, she being part, she was positive, of the trees at home; of the house there, ugly, rambling all to bits and pieces as it was; part of people she had never met; being laid out like a mist between the people she knew best, who lifted her on their branches as she had seen the trees lift the mist, but it spread ever so far, her life, herself. But what was she dreaming as she looked into Hatchards' shop window?"
Pages 11, 12

"Oddly enough, she was one of the most thorough-going sceptics he had ever met... possibly she said to herself, as we are doomed race, chained to a sinking ship (her favorite reading as a girl was Huxley and Tyndall, and they were fond of these nautical metaphors), as the whole thing is a bad joke, let us, at any rate, do our part; mitigate the sufferings of our fellow-prisoners (Huxley again); decorate the dungeon with flowers and air-cushions; be as decent as we possibly can."
Pages 86, 87 “Just now!” She said that with her Italian accent. She said that herself. He shaded his eyes so that he might see only a little of her face at a time, first the chin, then the nose, then the forehead, in case it were deformed, or had some terrible mark on it. But no, there she was, perfectly natural, sewing, with the pursed lips that women have, the set, the melancholy expression, when sewing. But there was nothing terrible about it, he assured himself, looking a second time, a third time at her face, her hands, for what was frightening or disgusting in her as she sat there in broad daylight, sewing?"
Page 157 (This, weird as it may sound, is my favourite quote! How did she manage to capture that thought so well. I do that sometimes when I look at myself in the mirror, afraid I might have changed drastically overnight.)

“Then (she had felt it only this morning) there was the terror; the overwhelming incapacity, one’s parents giving it into one’s hands, this life, to be lived to the end, to be walked with serenely; there was in the depths of her heart an awful fear."
Page 203