Lois McMaster Bujold · 367 pages
Rating: (11.3K votes)
“We should have taken our chances back then, when we were young and beautiful and didn't even know it.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“The dead cannot cry out for justice; it is a duty of the living to do so for them.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“If you make it plain you like people, it's hard for them to resist liking you back.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“If the truth doesn't save us, what does that say about us?”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“We did it," he muttered to Ekaterin, now perching on the chair arm. "Why didn't anybody stop us? Why aren't there more regulations about this sort of thing? What fool in their right mind would put me in charge of a baby? Two babies?”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“I always thought my parents could fix anything. Now it's my turn. Dear God, how did this happen?”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“to slide halfway to stupid and stop was rare indeed.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“All sorts of men don't make it home for the births of their children. But My mother was out of town on the day I was born, so she missed it, just seems . . . seems like a more profound complaint, somehow.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“Are we not all called on to yield our children back to the world, in the end?”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“Military intelligence was as nothing to military stupidity.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“To Komarr, my lord? Or Sergyar?” “No. Calculate the shortest possible jump route directly to Rho Ceta.” Vorpatril’s head jerked back in startlement. “If the orders I received from Sector Five HQ mean what we think, you’ll hardly get passage there. Reception by plasma fire and fusion shells the moment you pop out of the wormhole would be what I’d expect.” “Unpack, Miles,” Ekaterin’s voice drifted in. He grinned briefly at the familiar exasperation in her voice. “By the time we arrive there, I will have arranged our clearances with the Cetagandan Empire.” I hope. Or else they were all going to be in more trouble than Miles ever wanted to imagine. “Barrayar is bringing their kidnapped haut babies back to them. On the end of a long stick. I get to be the stick.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“Right.” Roic nodded. He glanced over Miles’s growing array of medical attachments. “By the way, m’lord. Had you happened to mention your seizure disorder to the surgeon yet?”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“And . . . it would be a real relief for me to have someone along I can talk to freely.” Her smile tilted a little at this. “Talk, or vent?” “I—hem!—suspect this one is going to entail quite a lot of venting, yes. D’you think you can stand it?”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“Miles bowed, sitting; his floater bobbed slightly. “My horse would like you fine. He’s extremely amiable, not to mention much too old and lazy to stampede anywhere. And I personally guarantee that with a Vorkosigan liveried armsman at your back, not the most benighted backcountry hick would offer you insult.” Roic,”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“Send a patroller to check,” said Miles a little tightly. Remembering he was supposed to be a diplomat, he added, “If you please.” Teris”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“I’ll bet. I . . .” He couldn’t say it, not so baldly. He dodged, while he mustered courage. “I promised to call Nicol when I had news of Bel, and I haven’t had a chance. The news, as you may know, is not good; we found Bel, but the herm has been deliberately infected with a bioengineered Cetagandan parasite that may . . . may prove lethal.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“The second ward was declared a temporary holding cell for their prisoner, the ba, who followed in the procession, bound to a float pallet. Miles scowled as the pallet drifted past, towed on its control lead by a watchful, muscular sergeant.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“But the herm was gray-faced, lips purple-blue, eyelids fluttering. An IV pump, not dependent upon potentially erratic ship’s gravity, infused yellow fluid rapidly into Bel’s right arm. The left arm was strapped to a board; plastic tubing filled with blood ran from under a bandage and into a hybrid appliance bound around with quantities of plastic tape. A second tube ran back again, its dark surface moist with condensation.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“Anyway, I’m sure you’ll be able to handle Garnet Five. Just be your usual charming self.” Ekaterin’s vision of him, he reminded himself, was not exactly objective. Thank God. “I’ve been trying to charm quaddies all day, with no noticeable success.” “If you make it plain you like people, it’s hard for them to resist liking you back. And Nicol will be playing in the orchestra tonight.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, quote from Diplomatic Immunity
“But love is battling cocaine for love’s attention.”
― Mary Elizabeth, quote from Delinquents
“And for the partridge there was the sun suddenly shut out, the foul flailing blackness spreading wings above, the roar ceasing, the blazing knives driving in, the terrible white face descending – hooked and masked and horned and staring-eyed. And then the back-breaking agony beginning, and snow scattering from scuffling feet, and snow filling the bill’s wide silent scream, till the merciful needle of the hawk’s beak notched in the straining neck and jerked the shuddering life away.
And for the hawk, resting now on the soft flaccid bulk of his prey, there was the rip and tear of choking feathers, and hot blood dripping from the hook of the beak, and rage dying slowly to a small hard core within.
And for the watcher, sheltered for centuries from such hunger and such rage, such agony and such fear, there is the memory of that sabring fall from the sky, and the vicarious joy of the guiltless hunter who kills only through his familiar, and wills him to be fed.”
― J.A. Baker, quote from The Peregrine
“This is important because our behavior is affected by our assumptions or our perceived truths. We make decisions based on what we think we know.”
― Simon Sinek, quote from Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action
“Thank God for a little holy disobedience.”
― Jared Brock, quote from A Year of Living Prayerfully: How a Curious Traveler Met the Pope, Walked on Coals, Danced with Rabbis, and Revived His Prayer Life
“Actually, I think it's the opposite. We know each other so well there isn't anything left to say. Sometimes it's nice just sitting here with you all, thinking. It's only best friends who can be comfortable with silence, wouldn't you say?”
― Benjamin Wood, quote from The Bellwether Revivals
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