History Awesome / Literature

[[AC:2001: A Space Odyssey]]

--> "Now you put me here in the hot seat and rig this kangaroo court up to intimidate me. But I've been over there where intimidation is done by experts. So you don't frighten me, Bret. You don't frighten me at all.

** Daphne Tercius getting over her own trauma and inferority complexes, and [[PercussiveMaintenence rebooting]] Phaethon from his HeroicBSOD. Also a SugarWiki/{{Funny Moment|s}}.

* In Steve Alten's Literature/{{Meg}} series, in the first book, the protagonist Jonas Taylor is swallowed by a megalodon in a bathysphere. While in the meg's stomach, he uses a fossilized megalodon tooth that he keeps as a souvenir to ''cut through the meg's innards and then CUT ITS HEART OUT''.
* In Ran Prieur's "Apocalypsopolis" (just go to www.ranprieur.com and check the sidebar), the AuthorAvatar character decides to bring down the American government using a disease he has an immunity to. He gets caught by security forces, interrogated, "forcibly questioned", and then passes out, upon which he is visited by a gang of [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotSymbolic extremly symbolic]] SufficientlyAdvancedAliens. ''And then pwns them''.

* Pretty much everything Kissur [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy White]] falcon ever says or does in Yulia Latynina's ''Wizards and Ministers'' and ''Insider''. Literally: a few contemplative or romantic moments aside, he can't seem to be able to appear in a scene without doing something utterly awesome. But the finest has to be the culmination of "Wizards and Ministers", where, after failing to persuade the agents of the Federation of the Twelve to use their technology to bring about a quick end to the current civil war in the Empire of Veya (where the novels are set; at the moment he also happens to be the Prime Minister of Veya) he stole one of their super-modern planes with the help of a countryman with very minor flying experience, waited for them to extract the Emperor of Veya from captivity as part of their {{plan}}, proclaimed that from now on, as a soldier in the Veyan army, he only followed the orders of Kissur and bombed the hell out of the rebel camp, destroying the main rebel army and the entire rebel leadership. Then he crash-landed the plane and moved as fast as he could to the capital, where he immediately gave ''everyone'' in the palace a BreakingSpeech. And then he committed suicide because he felt insulted by the Emperor's earlier mistrust, by throwing a knife in his chest with maximum precision after scaring everyone by seeming to threaten the Emperor. And ''then'', thanks to advanced Federation technology, he got better in time for the epilogue, during which he reaffirmed his bonds of friendship with the resident MagnificentBastard, to the explicit sheer horror of everyone else. Breathtaking.

* ''Eye of the Needle'': Lucy, after a grueling night holding off the assault from German spy Heinrich, is about to throw in the towel when it seems he's finally gotten to use the house's radio and can hold her at gunpoint if she enters the room. Then she sees the U-boat he's transmitting to and realizes just how big the stakes are (before, she thought he was "just" a serial killer) and blows out the house's power by unscrewing a light bulb and ''jamming her fingers in the socket''. In front of her three-year-old son. Numerous characters remark on this badassery afterwards.
* In ''Against the Odds'' the final book in a series, one of the characters shuts up a room full of arguing politicians. What makes this awesome is that she was considered a fluffhead for most of the series.
* MagnificentBastard Grendel in John Gardner's ''Literature/{{Grendel}}'' seems to be at his best during the sequence when he starts pelting Unferth in the face with apples, breaking his nose while mocking his concept of being a hero. Then when Unferth drags himself through the nightmarish swamp to get to Grendel's lair, and proceeds to give a lengthy speech about dying as a hero before passing out, Grendel almost kills him...before realizing that leaving Unferth alive is far greater punishment than anything else he could do to him. He then carries him back, unharmed, to the humans' castle and deposits him gently on the doorstep...and then kills two of the guards, "Just so as not to be misunderstood." I mean...just wow.
* In Jo Graham's novel ''Black Ships'', the protagonist is the priestess of the goddess of death. One morning, spurred on by a vision, she runs towards her city, only to discover that it's being invaded. When she arrives -- dressed in ceremonial attire that makes her look like the goddess in question -- she screams at the men to stop, yelling, "On your knees to Death!" And it works. Every combatant sinks to his knees.
* In ''The Rosetta Key'' By William Dietrich, Ethan Gage, after being shot at with his own gun by his nemesis Najac, fights his way through an entire Napoleonic French Platoon with nothing but a metal bar in less then 60 seconds, and then surving as Najac fires on him at point blank range - with the ramrod still in the barrel. Gage survives and proceeds to use the ramrod in his chest to pierce the other man's heart - Of course, the only reason he survived the ramrod was because it had hit a gold cylinder he had kept in his shirt.

* ElizabethMoon's [[Literature/TheDeedOfPaksenarrion Paksenarrion]], during the third book ''Oath of Gold''.

--->'''Priest of Liart''': And now, paladin? Where is your lord's protection now?''
--->'''Paks''': The High Lord has dominion. Gird has upheld me here; I have not failed. * passes out from the pain*

--->'''Paks''': * takes off helmet, revealing her shaved, scarred, generally horribly maltreated head* You're wrong. And this is the proof of it.
--->'''Village elder''': * opens mouth, shuts mouth, says nothing*

* In the ''Literature/TomSwift IV'' novel "Mind Games", Tom and company are playtesting a new computer-assisted Tabletop RPG, "Galaxy Masters"; unfortunately, the DM playing the villain Dedstorm is a {{Munchkin}} supreme, and he has the tactics to back up his blowhard demeanor. In the grand finale, Tom hits upon two {{GameBreaker}}s that turn the entire game around (and expose some nasty problems with the game mechanics): he destroys one of the game's {{MacGuffin}}s, both of which are needed for the villain to win (but only one is required for the heroes), and when the heroes are backed into a corner by Dedstorm's legion of Energy Wraiths, with Tom's lone weapon short on power, he comes up with an unorthodox combination of function cylinders (that basically involves ''duct-taping them together'' in order to circumvent the fact that they're not supposed to be ''turned backwards'') that turns the weapon into an energy vacuum, sucking up the Wraiths and recharging his gun. When the DM realizes Tom has him beat, he leaves the table, whining "it's just a stupid game".
* The [=SotS=] novel ''The Deacon's Tale'' has several.

** Britomart's defeat of Radigund in Book 5. Whoah, that was intense!

* In Sir Creator/WalterScott's novel ''Rob Roy'', Rob Roy's wife Helen Macgregor appears as a blood-curdlingly awesome brigand queen. Her appearance is one long Moment of Awesome, especially when she's having prisoners thrown into Loch Lomond.

* ''Earth Logic'': The nigh-omnipotent G'deon Karis takes down a fortress singlehandedly, with a ball-pen hammer, with one strike. As one character puts it, after seeing the result (the stones continuing to fall and roll away from each other until not a single one is touching another) "Did you ''have'' to do that? Now this wall will ''never'' finish falling."

* Creator/NeilGaiman's ''Literature/TheGraveyardBook'': Silas is arguing with Bod about Bod being allowed to go into the outside world. Silas presents the argument that if Bod goes, he will have no one to protect him from the man Jack. Bod's response? "It's not a question of who will protect me from him... but who will protect him from me
* ''One Thousand and One Nights'' is perhaps the only time a Moment of Awesome appears in the FramingDevice. Sheherazade single-handedly averts the murderous rage of the King by telling him a story which ends on a {{cliffhanger}} so enticing that he has to keep her alive so he can hear the ending. Then she does it ''a thousand more times'' until he is cured of his hatred of women.

* The Heritage/Legacy/Inheritance trilogies (no, not THAT Inheritance Trilogy) by Ian Douglas are pretty much ever-escalating Crowning Moments for humanity and the Xul. First, the Xul manage to rule the galaxy for ''ten million years'' after obliterating the rulers before them. Humanity goes to war against them and manages to avoid being completely wiped out of existence. Then humanity discovers that the Xul have a Dyson Cloud around the ''black hole at the center of the Milky Way''. Humanity's response is to ''hit it with a star''.

* Creator/JohnGrisham's ''The Appeal'' is a Moment of Awesome Carl Trudeau has been planning for months. Not only does he get the chemical company back on its feet in record time, he wrecks the small-town firm in the process.

* The climax of ''[[Literature/TheDarkangelTrilogy The Darkangel]]'' by Meredith Ann Pierce. Aeriel refuses to kill the darkangel and chooses instead to redeem him - by cutting out her own heart and placing it in his chest to replace the one that was coated in lead by the witch. The duarough gets one that follows up her romantic sacrifice with a Crowning Moment of Logical Thought. He holds the lead heart over a lamp and melts the lead off it, then puts ''that'' in ''her'' chest to bring her back to life.]]

** I'm gonna go with punching an old lady in the teeth. He had reasons, but really, the action just sorta stands on its own.
* No love for Gore's fight with the Starflyer Assassin in Judas Unchained from the ''Literature/CommonwealthSaga''? Brainwashed assassin plus angry papa/grandpapa-wolf, plus all the implanted high tech technology money can buy = one awesome fight sequence.

* In ''Flinx Transcendent'', Creator/AlanDeanFoster[='=]s final novel in the [[Literature/HumanxCommonwealth Flinx and Pip]] series, the titular hero singlehandedly convinces the [=AAnn=], centuries-long enemies of mankind, to suspend all hostile activity in the face of the oncoming threat, by brazenly walking into their seat of government in disguise and sending the Emperor and his entire council on an [[ExpositionBeam astral projection]] without their consent.
* In Sean Mcmullan's clockpunk post-apocalypse novel [[Literature/GreatwinterTrilogy Souls In The Great Machine]], there are quite a few:
** The first use of the Battle Calculor and then, much later, the defeat of the Alspring knock-off]]

* ''Have Courage, Hazel Green!'' has a brilliant Moment of Awesome in the courtyard scene.
* Since no one's mentioned anything by L.E. Modesitt, Jr., in ''Darknesses'', Alucius, after beating two ifrits and wrecking their Tables, and after being discharged from the military, has twenty assassins sent after him. He realizes they're there, rides right into the trap, and kills them all.

* ''A Good Clean Fight'' by Derek Robinson: The German army has sent a force out into the desert to intercept the SAS patrols that have been raiding their airfields. They do eventually manage to find the SAS, but it doesn't quite work out as planned. The Germans have superior numbers, plus mortars and heavy machine guns. The SAS have two commandos with knives and pistols. Obviously the Germans never stand a chance.

* In Frank E. Peretti's ''This Present Darkness'', the angel Guilo gets one at the end when his captain allows him to sound the victory in his place.

* In Guy Gavriel Kay's ''Literature/{{TheLionsOfAlRassan}}'' the fanatical expy-Muslim Muwardi desert warriors have attacked an expy-Christian encampment. Their leader's first move is to bash in the skull of a thirteen year old boy. Then, for the next handful of pages, you think this is going to be a Crowning Moment of Heartbreak where we see the boy die because no-one has the skills to save him. Then - the expy-Jewish refugee doctor steps up to the plate and performs their world's first trepanation to relieve the pressure on the boy's brain. It's an operation no-one had believed possible, or dared to perform before this but this man ''knows'' he has the skills to pull it off. And he does and the boy lives. What makes this even more awesome is that he blind and dumb and performs the operation by memory, instinct and feel with his wife translating his instructions since she is the only one who can understand him. It is a scene to make you cry with joy and exultation.

* The Literature/KittyNorville series is relatively restrained when it comes to Crowning Moments, but still earns a few.

* The short story "The Man At the Table" by C.B. Gilford features a wonderful Awesome Moment. Byron Duquay is sitting at a card table, preparing for guests, when an escaped killer, Rick Masden, enters his home. Duquay convices Masden to sit at the opposite end of the table for a drink. Masden demands money and the keys to Duquay's car. Duquay says he will give Masden neither, and then proceeds to tell him that if Masden attempts to get up with his knife, Duquay will upend the table on him and grab his own, larger knife. Masden is a clearly less muscular than Duquay, and at a disadvantage in a physical fight. Masden quickly realizes that Duquay was expecting company, and that Duquay is trying to delay him until help can arrive, which Duquay admits calmly. They reach an arrangement where Masden will leave his knife behind and leave empty-handed. It is just then that the other guests arrive, and Masden is apprehended. [[BatmanGambit we learn that delaying Masden wasn't Duquay's real gambit. Bluffing him into thinking that he could and would fight Masden was. Duquay was paralyzed from the waist down, unable to stand. His wife had placed him in the chair earlier so he would feel like less of an invalid when playing cards with his friends.
* In the David Brin novella Thor versus Captain America, the protagonist taunts Odin to the point of intolerable rage, grabs Gugnir out of the air and SNAPS IT OVER HIS KNEE (it broke his leg, but they were executing him in a minute anyway) when it is thrown at him.

* In ''Pilgrimage: The Book of the People'', Valancy vs. the fire. "Get under the tarp!"
* The NoMoreHoldingBackSpeech from Jennifer Cruise and Bob Mayer's ''Agnes and the Hitman'', which deserves to be reprinted in full:

* In [[Literature/HenryHuggins Henry and Ribsy]], Henry lands a 29-pound salmon with his ''bare hands''.

* In ''About Average'', by Andrew Clements, Jordan Johnston saves the lives of two dozen people, including herself, when a tornado strikes.
* [[Creator/IsaacAsimov The Last Question]]:

* The reveal scenes in Stephen Fry's ''The Star's Tennis Balls'' (''Revenge'' in America). Although, these were somewhat more bittersweet, and frankly, kind of scary. But still, the computer screen flashing the phrase 'Ned Maddstone sends you to Hell' was just brilliant.

* This little-known (and highly underrated) disaster novel features an out-of-control nuclear reactor which, for various reasons, is creating a super-powerful magnetic field around itself. Cars, aircraft, ships - all are powerless to rescue the personnel from the island on which the reactor rests. Out of the blue comes their salvation, Dunkirk-fashion - the Baton Rouge Yacht Squadron, sailing to the rescue.

* In ''Flinx Transcendent'', Creator/AlanDeanFoster[='=]s final novel in the [[Literature/HumanxCommonwealth Flinx and Pip]] series, the titular hero singlehandedly convinces the [=AAnn=], centuries-long enemies of mankind, to suspend all hostile activity in the face of the oncoming UltimateEvil, by brazenly walking into their seat of government in disguise and sending the Emperor and his entire council on an [[ExpositionBeam astral projection]] without their consent.

* The first section of Allen Ginsberg's "Literature/{{Howl}}" catalogs death, drugs, madhouses, and just about every physical and mental torture the beats experienced, yet in the last few lines we learn that all of this is utterly worth it, because it has inspired POETRY that "blew the suffering of America's naked mind for love". Now that is some powerful verse.

* In [[Creator/BeverlyCleary Henry and Ribsy]], Henry lands a 29-pound salmon with his ''bare hands''.

* Creator/FrankHerbert's ''Literature/TheDosadiExperiment'' features one long one for hero Jorj X. [=McKie=] in its last two chapters. The aliens known as Gowachin have an absurdly complex and Kafka-esque legal system, and despite [=McKie=]'s extensive training in their practices, he's barely able to survive a meeting with a Gowachin attorney early in the book. By the end, his experiences have made him far more hardened and pragmatic, and upon entering a Gowachin courtroom he's able to play the whole system like a violin to see that the guilty are all punished, and set in motion some pretty big changes to come (unfortunately, AuthorExistenceFailure means we don't get to see those plans come to fruition).

* The WorldOfCardboardSpeech from Jennifer Cruise and Bob Mayer's ''Agnes and the Hitman'', which deserves to be reprinted in full:

* In Edmund Spenser's ''Literature/TheFaerieQueene'', Lady Una gets one of these when Redcrosse is on the verge of committing suicide for his sins. She's been in immense danger because of him deserting her to follow TheVamp around as a bodyguard/boytoy, then had to hire KingArthur to rescue him from said villainess, acting supportive and forgiving throughout. But when a bad guy talks Redcrosse into wiping his dishonour out with blood, Una puts her foot down and delivers a concise, well-reasoned series of verbal bitchslaps.

[[AC:{{Other}}]]