“I’m a liar and a cheat and a coward, but I will never, ever, let a friend down. Unless of course not letting them down requires honesty, fair play, or bravery.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Humanity can be divided into madmen and cowards. My personal tragedy is in being born into a world where sanity is held to be a character flaw.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“We all practice self-deception to a degree; no man can handle complete honesty without being cut at each turn. There's not enough room in a man's head for sanity alongside each grief, each worry, each terror that he owns. I’m well used to burying such things in a dark cellar and moving on.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“With Snorri troubles were always put front and centre and dealt with. My style was more to shove them under the rug until the floor got too uneven to navigate, and then to move house.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“I've always felt that the placement of a man's testicles is an eloquent argument against intelligent design.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“I was more ass than assassin.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Bravery may be observed when a person tramples one fear whilst in secret flight from a greater terror. And those whose greatest terror is being thought a coward are always brave. I, on the other hand, am a coward.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Life has ways of getting under your skin, spoiling your fun with too much information. Youth is truly the happiest time where we roll in the bliss of ignorance.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“To err is human, to forgive is divine... but I’m only a cardinal and cardinals are human, so rather than forgiving you I’m going to err towards beating you with this stick.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Mountains are pretty at a distance, but my advice is to never let them get to be more than scenery.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Bravery is just a different kind of broken.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Battles are all about strategy, and strategy pivots on priorities. Since my priorities were Prince Jalan, Prince Jalan, and Prince Jalan, with “looking good” a distant fourth, I took the opportunity to resume running away. I find that the main thing about success is the ability to act in the moment. A hero attacks in the moment; a good coward runs in it. The rest of the world waits for the next moment and ends up as crow food.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“When you become a father, it changes you." Snorri spoke towards the fire’s glow. "You see the world in new ways. Those who are not changed were not properly men to begin with.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“A warrior fears the battle he missed. More than any fight he can make his own, he fears the fight that’s gone, that ended without him, that no feat of arms can change.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“And that’s how it is in this world, boy. Start a tale, just a little tale that should fade and die—take your eye off it for just a moment and when you turn back it’s grown big enough to grab you up in its teeth and shake you. That’s how it is. All our lives are tales. Some spread, and grow in the telling. Others are just told between us and the gods, muttered back and forth behind our days, but those tales grow too and shake us just as fierce.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“I’ve always found hitting a man from behind to be the best way to go about things. This can sometimes be accomplished by dint of a simple ruse. Classics such as, “What’s that over there?” work surprisingly often, but for truly optimal results it’s best if the person doesn’t ever know you were there.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“I always knew you'd try this Viking shit on me.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“You would think it best to save your breath for running, but I often find screaming helps.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Dropping into a thorn bush can lead to no end of grief.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“We’ll have to get you a sword,” I said. “When funds allow.”
Snorri shook his head. “An axe for me. Swords trick you into thinking you can defend. With an axe all you can do is attack. That’s what my father named me. Snorri. It means ‘attack.’” He lifted the axe above his head. “Men think they can defend against me—but when I knock, they open.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Maeres’s companion, though, he looked like the sort of man who would drown kittens recreationally.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Cleverness builds ever more elaborate structures of self-justification.... But in the end you know what is and what is not right. All men do, though they may spend their years trying to bury that knowing, burying it beneath words, hatred, lusts, sorrow, or any of the other bricks from which they build their lives... When the time comes, you'll know. But knowing is never enough.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Yes, I should grow up, and yes, I will, but there’s time for that tomorrow. Today is for living.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Part of the art of survival as a coward is not letting things get to the point where that cowardice is exposed.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“I didn't ask anything—I hadn't the words. Instead I spoke the smallest one—the one I should have used more in my short and foolish life.
Sorry.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“It’s often said that cowards make the best torturers. Cowards have good imaginations, imaginations that torment them with all the worst stuff of nightmare, all the horrors that could befall them. This provides an excellent arsenal when it comes to inflicting misery on others. And their final qualification is that they understand the fears of their victim better than the victim does himself.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“It's good to steer a man in the direction he intended to go. It blurs the line between what he wants and what you want.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Snow makes a soft bed, but no man wakes from it. That was the wisdom of the North.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
“Enjoy the world while you can I say. A shallow enough philosophy by which to live, but shallow is what I've got. Besides deep is apt to drown you.”
― Mark Lawrence, quote from Prince of Fools
Mark Lawrence
Born place: in The United States
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“Lord Gareth?" He froze. It was she, staring out at him with an expression of astounded disbelief on her lovely face. Gareth was caught totally unprepared. He knew he must look like an arse because he certainly felt like one. But the comic ridiculousness of the situation suddenly hit him, and his lips began twitching uncontrollably. He gazed up at her with perfect innocence. "Hello, Juliet." A chorus of out-of-tune voices came up from below. "Romeo, O Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?" Gareth flung his crop down at their heads. Cokeham let out a yelp, then fell to laughing. The girl's smooth, high brow pleated in a frown as she took in the scene. Perry down there with the horses. The other Den of Debauchery members all gathered below, beaming stupidly up at her. And Gareth, grinning, sprawled full-length along a tree branch just outside her window. "Just what on earth are you doing, Lord Gareth?" The way she said it made his cheeks warm with embarrassment. So he was a pillock. Who cared? Instead, he gave her his most devastating grin and said with cheerful earnestness, "Why, I have come to rescue you, of course." "Rescue me?" "Surely you didn't think I'd allow Lucien to banish you into obscurity, now, did you?" "Well, I — The duke didn't ban—" She gave a disbelieving little laugh and leaned out the window, grasping the blanket tightly at her breasts. Her hair, caught in a long, dark braid, swung tantalizingly out over her bosom. "Really, Lord Gareth. This is ... highly irregular!" "Yes, but the hour is late, and as it took me all day to find you, I was feeling rather impatient. I do hope you'll forgive me for resorting to such desperate measures. May I come in and talk?" "Of course not! I — I cannot have a man in my bedroom!" "Why not, my sweet?" He pushed aside a small, leafy twig in order to see her better and grinned cajolingly up at her. "I had you in mine." She shook her head, torn between what she wanted to do — and what she ought to do. "Really, Lord Gareth ... your brother will never approve of this. You should go home. After all, you're the son of a duke and I'm just a — " " — beautiful young woman with nowhere else to go. A beautiful young woman who should be a part of my family. Now, do collect Charlotte and your things, Miss Paige — I fear we must make haste, if we are to marry before Lucien catches up to us." "Marry?!" she cried, forgetting to whisper. He gazed at her in blank, perfect innocence. "Well, yes, of course," he said, clinging to the branch as it dropped another few inches. "Surely you don't think I'd be hanging out of a tree for anything less, do you?" "But —" "Come now." He smiled disarmingly. "Surely, you must see there is really no other option for you. And I won't have my niece growing up without a father. What kind of a man do you think I am? Now, gather up Charlotte and get your things, my dear Miss Paige, and come outside. I am growing most uncomfortable." Juliet”
― Danelle Harmon, quote from The Wild One
“Perhaps she saw before her a lifetime of walking on the ruined earth and chose instead a single moment in the air.”
― Carolyn Parkhurst, quote from The Dogs of Babel
“A small town has as many eyes as a fly”
― Sonya Hartnett, quote from Surrender
“He spent the afternoon watching the indicator light turn from red to orange to green and thought about how useless it was to be angry at anybody about an abstract principle...How could any idea that drives a man away from the people who love him be considered sound?”
― Ryan Boudinot, quote from Blueprints Of The Afterlife
“The goal is not necessarily to succeed but to keep trying, to be the kind of person who has ideas and see them through. We’ll”
― Esmé Raji Codell, quote from Educating Esmé: Diary of a Teacher's First Year
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