George R.R. Martin · 690 pages
Rating: (18.8K votes)
“Oberyn wanted vengeance for Elia. Now the three of you want vengeance for him. I have four daughters, I remind you. Your sisters. My Elia is fourteen, almost a woman. Obella is twelve, on the brink of maidenhood. They worship you, as Dorea and Loreza worship them. If you should die, must El and Obella seek vengeance for you, then Dorea and Loree for them? Is that how it goes, round and round forever? I ask again, where does it end?" Ellaria Sand laid her hands on the Mountain's head. "I saw your father die. Here is his killer. Can I take a skull to bed with me, to give me comfort in the night? Will it make me laugh, write me songs, care for me when I am old and sick?”
― George R.R. Martin, quote from A Dance with Dragons: Dreams and Dust
“Aye," the prince said. "I told the story to Ser Balon, but not all of it. As the children splashed in the pools, Daenerys watched from amongst the orange trees, and a realization came to her. She could not tell the highborn from the low. Naked, they were only children. All innocent, all vulnerable, all deserving of long life, love, protection. "There is your realm," she told her son and heir, "remember them, on everything you do." My own mother said those same words to me when I was old enough to leave the pools. It is an easy thing for a prince to call the spears, but in the end the children pay the price. For their sake, the wise prince will wage non war without good cause, nor any war he cannot hope to win.
"I am not blind, nor deaf. I know that you all believe me weak, frightened, feeble. Your father knew me better. Oberyn was ever the viper. Deadly, dangerous, unpredictable. No man dared tread on him. I was the grass. Pleasant, complaisant, sweet-smelling, swaying with every breeze. Who fears to walk upon the grass? But it is the grass that hides the viper from his enemies and shelters him until he strikes. Your father and I worked more closely than you know...but now he is gone. The question is, can I trust his daughters to serve me in his place?”
― George R.R. Martin, quote from A Dance with Dragons: Dreams and Dust
“It is a wise woman who knows her place.”
― George R.R. Martin, quote from A Dance with Dragons: Dreams and Dust
“Snow still chose to dwell behind the armory, in a pair of modest rooms previously occupied by the Watch's late blacksmith. Perhaps he did not think himself worthy of the King's Tower, or perhaps he did not care. That was his mistake, the false humility of youth that is itself a sort of pride. It was never wise for a ruler to eschew the trappings of power, for power itself flows in no small measure from such trappings.”
― George R.R. Martin, quote from A Dance with Dragons: Dreams and Dust
“Trackers and hunters sworn to deepwood with clan names like Forrester and Woods, branch and bole.”
― George R.R. Martin, quote from A Dance with Dragons: Dreams and Dust
“Later, when Arianne had gone, he put down his longaxe and lifted Prince Doran into his bed. "Until the Mountain crushed my brother's skull, no Dornishman had died in this War of the Five Kings," the prince murmured softly, as Hotah pulled a blanket over him. "Tell me, Captain, is that my shame or my glory?”
― George R.R. Martin, quote from A Dance with Dragons: Dreams and Dust
“Oberyn her zaman bir yılandı. Ölümcül, tehlikeli ve öngörülemez. Kimse onu çiğnemeye cesaret edemezdi. Ben çimendim. Hoş, lütufkâr, güzel kokulu, her rüzgârla sallanan. Kim çimenin üstünden yürümekten korkar ki? Fakat yılanı düşmanlardan koruyan ve saldıracağı vakte kadar gizleyen, çimendir.”
― George R.R. Martin, quote from A Dance with Dragons: Dreams and Dust
“You know how to steer a yacht?" Mr. McIntyre asked Ian worriedly.
"I was born knowing how to steer a yacht," Ian said. Then a stricken look came over his face. "But–do you suppose Jonah prepaid the full amount for renting this? Once my dad hears what Natalie and I did, he'll cancel our credit cards."
"You mean we're...we're poor now?" Natalie gasped.
"Penniless," Ian said grimly.
"Actually," Mr. McIntyre said, "I should have mentioned this before the others left. Grace had an addendum to her will regarding everyone who made it through the gauntlet. There were eight of you–you will all receive double the amount you turned down to get the first clue."
"It was a million dollars originally," Ian said. "So Natalie and I each get two million dollars? I suppose we could live on that."
Natalie beamed.
"That is such a relief!" she said. "Being poor wasn't quite as bad as I thought it would be, but still–"
"You were only poor for about two seconds!" Dan protested, rolling his eyes.”
― Margaret Peterson Haddix, quote from Into the Gauntlet
“...this is what death does to you, it takes and takes, so that all that is left of your memories is a faint tracing of spilled ash.”
― Hilary Mantel, quote from Bring Up the Bodies
“He read political books. They gave him phrases which he could only speak to himself and use on Shama. They also revealed one region after another of misery and injustice and left him feeling more helpless and more isolated than ever. Then it was that he discovered the solace of Dickens. Without difficulty he transferred characters and settings to people and places he knew. In the grotesques of Dickens everything he feared and suffered from was ridiculed and diminished, so that his own anger, his own contempt became unnecessary, and he was given strength to bear the most difficult part of his day: dressing in the morning, that daily affirmation of faith in oneself, which at times for him was almost like an act of sacrifice.”
― V.S. Naipaul, quote from A House for Mr Biswas
“I began this book with the intention of concealing nothing, that those who liked might have the benefit of perusing a fellow creature's heart: but we have some thoughts that all the angels in heaven are welcome to behold -- but not our brother-men -- not even the best and kindest amongst them.”
― Anne Brontë, quote from Agnes Grey
“During the day, memories could be held at bay, but at night, dreams became the devil's own accomplices.”
― Sharon Kay Penman, quote from The Reckoning
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