“Mind yourself in that guardroom," Gilan told him. Thorn grinned cheerfully. He never had any stomach butterflies before a fight. "I plan to be subtle," he said.
Gilan looked at him, his head tilted curiously. "How's that?"
"Once we go through that door, I'll bash anything that moves. And if they don't move, Stig will bash them."
"You have a strange concept of subtle," Gilan said.
Thorn's grin grew wider, "So I've been told.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“Hal: "...Then we'll leave in a huff, taking you with us."
"I've always wanted to travel in a huff," Ingvar mused. "It sounds very comfortable. I imagine they're well padded."
"Lined with feathers, in fact," Gilan put in.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“What now?" Lydia asked. "I assume we have a plan B?"
He shook his head. "We're way past plan B," he told her. "And we've gone past plan C as well. We're up to plan D now."
"And what's plan D?"
He jerked his head down the alley to the corner. "Anyone comes round that corner, we shoot them."
She pursed her lips critically. "Doesn't sound too ingenious," she said.
He shrugged. "I'm not good at ingenious. I'm good at dangerous.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“Who’s Ikbar?” Ulf said. His brother turned away to hide a smirk. Gilan glanced at Hal curiously, saw he wasn’t planning to answer, so spoke in his place. “He was an Arridan demigod, I believe.” “Oh, don’t,” Hal said quietly. But it was too late. “And what did he do?” “Well, Ulf, I’m not sure that he did too much of anything,” Gilan said. “Just paraded round being a demigod.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“You think our mam likes you better than me?” challenged whichever one was the other. (Don’t blame me. I’ve lost track too.)”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“I think you're wonderful too, Hal!" Stephan said, in a workmanlike approximation of Ophelia's breathless, admiring tones. The crew laughed even harder.
Lydia snorted through her nose.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“Oh dear, oh deary me!" Thorn said in a ridiculous falsetto voice. "What are we going to do? It's twelve big hairy guardsmen and Mahmel in a natty green hat."
It was all very well to joke about it, Hal thought, but the situation was serious.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“Karina and Tho-orn, sitting in a tree-ee. Kay-eye-ess-ess-eye-en-gee.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“My name is Gilan. The King wants to see you.”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
“Just wanted you to know, there’s been no . . . funny business between me and your mam. No . . . hanky-panky, if you know what I mean?” For”
― John Flanagan, quote from Slaves of Socorro
John Flanagan
Born place: in Sydney, Australia
Born date May 22, 1944
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“What strange times we live in, when good must disguise itself in the tawdry rags of evil!”
― Amin Maalouf, quote from Balthasar's Odyssey
“Taking Off Emily Dickinson’s Clothes
First, her tippet made of tulle,
easily lifted off her shoulders and laid
on the back of a wooden chair.
And her bonnet,
the bow undone with a light forward pull.
Then the long white dress, a more
complicated matter with mother-of-pearl
buttons down the back,
so tiny and numerous that it takes forever
before my hands can part the fabric,
like a swimmer’s dividing water,
and slip inside.
You will want to know
that she was standing
by an open window in an upstairs bedroom,
motionless, a little wide-eyed,
looking out at the orchard below,
the white dress puddled at her feet
on the wide-board, hardwood floor.
The complexity of women’s undergarments
in nineteenth-century America
is not to be waved off,
and I proceeded like a polar explorer
through clips, clasps, and moorings,
catches, straps, and whalebone stays,
sailing toward the iceberg of her nakedness.
Later, I wrote in a notebook
it was like riding a swan into the night,
but, of course, I cannot tell you everything—
the way she closed her eyes to the orchard,
how her hair tumbled free of its pins,
how there were sudden dashes
whenever we spoke.
What I can tell you is
it was terribly quiet in Amherst
that Sabbath afternoon,
nothing but a carriage passing the house,
a fly buzzing in a windowpane.
So I could plainly hear her inhale
when I undid the very top
hook-and-eye fastener of her corset
and I could hear her sigh when finally it was unloosed,
the way some readers sigh when they realize
that Hope has feathers,
that Reason is a plank,
that Life is a loaded gun
that looks right at you with a yellow eye.”
― Billy Collins, quote from Picnic, Lightning
“All natural disasters are comforting because they reaffirm our impotence, in which, otherwise, we might stop believing. At times it is strangely sedative to know the extent of your own powerlessness.”
― Erica Jong, quote from Fear of Flying
“I doona want to be loved because I’m Undead. No more than ye would want to be rejected for being mortal.”
― Kerrelyn Sparks, quote from All I Want for Christmas is a Vampire
“Tarzan hungry, dijo el Mumintroll trepando una liana. Tarzan eat now!
¿Qué dice?, preguntó Snif
Dice que ahora va a comer, dijo la señorita Snork. Verás, es lo único que sabe hacer. Habla en inglés como todos los que viven en la selva.”
― Tove Jansson, quote from Finn Family Moomintroll
A Tale Dark & Grimm
The Oath of the Vayu...
The Double
Zero at the Bone
Danse Macabre
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