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This quotation is from the short story The Raven.

I knew my quotation this year had to come from The Medusa Frequency for personal reasons, as it's probably Russell Hoban's most profound book about a relationship, plus it was the very first of his books that I read, and is still my favourite. I wasn't sure which quote to choose though. When I went to my original copy, a battered Picador paperback, I found one page had been dog-eared long ago, and another was marked with a train ticket and a sheet of yellow paper from a previous SA4QE outing.

Since work obliged me to be in South Kensington on Russmass, I used a South Ken snippet from Amaryllis Night and Day; the plan had been to affix copies close to Hobanoid exhibits in three museums, but I was frustrated by huge crowds (V&A closed to walk-up customers) and by the fact that the Klein Bottles are no longer on display in the Science Museum's Mathematics Gallery. So it was a bit of a fizzle ... but still very enjoyable, as always, seeing the public peering at the yellow A4 sheets and ... let us hope ... deciding there and then to become lifelong Russ readers.

Quotes on yellow gold A4 paper, I placed in local Waterstones bookshop, between the books in Fiction where RH should be, but isn’t, and also in the teens and younger readers’ shelves. Footnote included a thinly veiled hint to the management regarding the absence of the author’s titles, considering this worldwide, SA4QE effect.
Soon, I will call in to see whether the yellow papers are still there.

This year I drew my quotes mostly from The Medusa Frequency, the first Russell Hoban book I read. It also has a personal significance for me since one of the most important relationships of my life arose four years ago from a conversation on Twitter about the book, trading favourite quotations back and forth. I also chose a quote from The Moment under The Moment in response to the current political climate, and finally a poem from The Pedalling Man about my home city of London. 

As in previous years, I chose three short quotes. My first comes from The Moment Under The Moment and was tacked onto the little jetty on my local river. This passage leaped off the page at me, as if it’d always been waiting for me to find it. I wanted to put it out in the world, so others could find it too - a shot of Hoban as they ambled onto the jetty. I also placed tiny versions of this quote in the local shop, mostly hidden behind packets of food so people would find them as they shopped; one ended up perched on top of a bumper packet of Wagonwheels (see photo).

My chosen quotation for this year's sA4qe is from the Hoban novel which I had surely already distributed most widely during 2015: 'Riddley Walker' ... I had circulated a couple of spare copies amongst friends on various occasions this year (some of the older picador editions I'd accrued from charity shops over the years) - I'd also recommended the novel to several more friends and colleagues in recent months.