We have winners for the movie-line contest, and I want to thank everyone for participating. I also want to thank the Academy for...oh, wait. Got confused for a second.

Here's the deal: I've gotten so swept up by the holiday spirit, I decided to send books to the first 10 correct respondents, rather than the first five.

The 10 people are:
Will Brown
Becky Wilson
David Benoit
Rick Moore
Wayne Gosnell
Grover Clifft
"Fredam728"
Helen Fremin
Andrew Cummings
Danny Bryant

If you're one of the winners, and you're reading this, I'll be sending you an email shortly.

Now, here are the movies the lines were pulled from:

1. Jaws
2. The Godfather
3. True Grit
4. Arthur
5. Braveheart
6. Caddyshack
7. Blues Brothers
8. Blazing Saddles
9. Fletch
10. The Outlaw Josey Wales
11. Animal House
12. Fast Times at Ridgemont High
13. The Exorcist
14. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
15. Stripes
16. National Lampoon’s Vacation
17. Airplane 2
18. The Shawshank Redemption
19. As Good As It Gets
20. Rocky
21. Ordinary People
22. Papillon
23. Monty Python & The Holy Grail
24. American Graffitti
25. Unforgiven
26. Terms of Endearment
27. The Big Chill
28. Fried Green Tomatoes

I love great movie lines, so much so that I started a casual collection of my favorites a few years back. Now, just in time for the holidays, you can use your knowledge of movie lines to win a signed paperback of Guilt Trip. (Sorry—U.S. addresses only.) Makes a great stocking stuffer.

All you have to do is identify five of these lines (tell me which movies they came from) and email your answers to me through my website (www.benrehder.com). Do NOT post your answers in the comments section! The first FIVE correct respondents will win a copy of the paperback.

I’ll reveal the winners, and the sources of all the movie lines, sometime next week.

The lines...(some of them are pretty darn easy)...

1. You’re gonna need a bigger boat.
2. Where does it say that you can’t kill a cop?
3. I’d call that bold talk for a one-eyed fatman.
4. Usually one must go to a bowling alley to meet a woman of your stature.
5. Freedom!
6. She’s been plucked more times than the Rose of Trillee, I’m told.
7. I hate Illinois Nazis.
8. Not only was it authentic frontier gibberish, it expressed a courage rarely seen in this day and age.
9. Can I borrow your towel? My car just hit a water buffalo.
10. Dying ain’t much of a livin’, boy.
11. Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?
12. People on ‘ludes should not drive.
13. The power of Christ compels you.
14. The next time I say, “Let's go someplace like Bolivia,” let's GO someplace like Bolivia.
15. I’ll still respect you. I’ll respect you even more. Just use more whipped cream.
16. Don’t know why they call this stuff Hamburger Helper. It does just fine all by itself.
17. I don’t think I’ll ever be over Macho Grande. Those wounds run pretty deep.
18. Get busy living, or get busy dying.
19. The best thing you have going here is your willingness to humiliate yourself.
20. You lay off that pet shop dame. Women weaken legs.
21. A little advice about feelings, kiddo. Don't expect it always to tickle.
22. Blame is for God and small children.
23. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.
24. Your car is uglier than I am! That didn’t come out right.
25. It’s a hell of thing, killing a man. You take away all he’s got and all he’s ever gonna have.
26. Imagine, you having a date with someone where it wasn’t necessarily a felony.
27. I feel like I got a great break on a used car.
28. You know, Miss Ruth was a lady, and a lady always knows when to leave.

A few years ago, when a Japanese publishing company bought the rights to Buck Fever, this is the cover art they came up with.

I absolutely love it, but probably not in the way they intended.

I received an interesting email today:

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We enjoyed "Guilt Trip". Good book.

HOWEVER

At the end of the novel, the publishers saw fit to include an excerpt from your forthcoming "Gun Shy". Hoo boy. Maybe it's just this piece of it, but the excerpt read as offensively left liberal.

Have you left your spiritual home in Blanco County and moved to Travis County? I hope to God you haven't.

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The book he mentions (Gun Shy, coming in May), addresses the issue of gun control. And I can understand his comments, because the book opens with a scene that parodies an enthusiastic gun rally. Unfortunately, that excerpt doesn’t tell the full story; it makes the book appear one-sided, but it’s not.

For the record, I own a fairly large collection of guns and rifles, and I support the Second Amendment. If I were forced to protect myself or someone I love from a criminal, I would. Same goes with the sanctity of my home. If I caught an intruder breaking in, I would feel justified using deadly force to keep him out. (If you don’t want to get shot, don’t break into peoples’ homes.) I feel that gun-related crime in America should be blamed on criminals, not on guns. With a few exceptions (such as the five-day waiting period and criminal background checks), I think gun-control laws are misguided and ineffective.

That being said...as much as I believe in my right to own a gun, I respect your right to disagree with me, and to campaign for what you believe in. I’ll even listen to your argument against guns, but I’ll attempt to refute it with facts of my own. I try to remain reasonable, and to remember that our society, by its nature, has to accommodate a variety of opposing opinions.

However, when you study any important issue—whether it’s gun control or abortion or the death penalty or the war on terrorism—you’ll find extremists on either end of the spectrum. These people are certain that their opinion is the right one, and they are not open to intelligent discussion about it. The scary thing is, they’d be thrilled if they could impose their views on the rest of us. They’ll gladly manipulate the facts or use scare tactics to further their own agenda. These types of people piss me off, no matter what their politics—even when we are on the “same side” on a particular issue.

But there is one great thing about these self-righteous extremists—it’s a lot of fun to create caricatures of them. Which is what I do in Gun Shy. I satirize blowhards on both sides of the gun debate—the people who believe that every citizen has a god-given right to own a rocket launcher, and the people who think a slingshot should require an owner’s permit. I spoof the sort of person who wants you to shut up and let them make the rules, because, damn it, they know what’s best for everybody. Ultimately, the book isn’t about gun control, it’s about people who think their own opinion is more valid than yours, and that they have the right to decide how you should live. They're wrong on both counts.

And you’d better agree with me, because I’m heavily armed.

When my first book, Buck Fever, came out, I did everything I could to publicize it. That included sending it to virtually any member of the media who might want to review it. Not long after I mailed it to an outdoors columnist who writes for small-town newspapers and regional magazines, he sent this reply:

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Mr. Rehder,

After a recent “hunt” at a ranch that, I was sorry to learn, released pen-raised birds before each outing, I was faced with the ethical question of what to write about an operation of which I do not approve. A fellow writer whose opinion I highly respect told me I had to use my own judgment, and compromising my integrity was not an option.

I find myself in much the same situation now.

While I realize that our society has been desensitized to foul language and promiscuity, I find this a deplorable result of life imitating what passes for art in a self-serving world. I do not use foul language in my speech or my work, and I disapprove of those who do.

I judge literature by asking whether I would want my children, or my mother, to read it. I could not recommend your book to either. I managed to get through the first chapter, and that was far enough. The language of the poachers is not acceptable by any means, and I found the attempts at humor rather sophomoric. Worse, the first appearance of the game warden, supposedly the protagonist of the story, finds him in bed with a woman not his wife.

Thank you for the offer of allowing me to review your book but, under the circumstances, I believe it will be necessary for me to pass.

Sincerely,

XXX

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Of course, I sent him an email defending my right to write whatever I want. I pointed out that, if publishers felt the same way he did, most of the greatest writers of all time would have never made it to print. I find it ridiculous that he judges literature by whether he would want his children or his mother to read it. Not all books are for all people.

I also found it silly that he didn’t criticize the poaching or the drunk driving in the book, but rather the language and the “promiscuity”—things that are NOT illegal.

What do you think? Does he have a valid point? Are books too raunchy or lacking in moral direction nowadays? Or is he just a tightass?

I’d love to hear your thoughts.