“I have a secret passion for mercy. But justice is what keeps happening to people.”
― Ross Macdonald, quote from The Goodbye Look
“We merged our lonelinesses once again, in something less than love but sweeter than self. I didn’t get home to West Los Angeles after all.”
― Ross Macdonald, quote from The Goodbye Look
“I’ve spilled all my secrets. How do you make people do it?” “I don’t. People like to talk about what’s hurting them. It takes the edge off the pain sometimes.”
― Ross Macdonald, quote from The Goodbye Look
“What did the old man want?” “Your husband’s money, just like everyone else.” “But not you, eh?” Her voice was sardonic. “Not me,” I said. “Money costs too much.”
― Ross Macdonald, quote from The Goodbye Look
“daughter?’ ‘She was a beautiful child.’ Mrs Williams’s eyes grew misty with the quasi-maternal feelings of a procuress.”
― Ross Macdonald, quote from The Goodbye Look
“That isn’t your real motivation. I know your type. You have a secret passion for justice. Why don’t you admit it?” “I have a secret passion for mercy,” I said. “But justice is what keeps happening to people.”
― Ross Macdonald, quote from The Goodbye Look
“I’m sick of always doing the professional thing for prudential reasons.’ I”
― Ross Macdonald, quote from The Goodbye Look
Ross Macdonald
Born place: in Los Gatos, California,, The United States
Born date December 13, 1915
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“It’s the moment when you know that you can have what you want if you’re only brave enough to say so. It’s a split second when everything can change, but you pussy out because you’re too afraid to risk the rejection.”
― Penelope Douglas, quote from Until You
“He reminded me of a kid in my first-grade class, Mikey. Mikey used to talk about his pencil at Show’n’Tell. It was a fat green pencil with the school’s name and district number stenciled on it. Every kid in the class had an identical pencil. But that didn’t stop Mikey. He would hold it up for us to see, read the stenciled name and number to us, tell us it was a gift from his grandma, or his dad, or his uncle, tell us how green it was, and how fat, tell us how we must be sure to turn the dial on the pencil sharpener to the very biggest hole before attempting to sharpen such a pencil, point out to those who’d just joined us that yes it was a pencil, and yes wasn’t it a fat one, and wasn’t it green, and he’d show it and tell it and tell it and show it till children of frailer constitution started passing out from ennui and the teacher would have to carry him by his belt, telling all the way, to his desk.”
― David James Duncan, quote from The River Why
“I mused for a few moments on the question of which was worse, to lead a life so boring that you are easily enchanted, or a life so full of stimulus that you are easily bored.”
― Bill Bryson, quote from The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America
“He put a hand on his throat, as though trying to stop the words, but they came anyway.
"You're home. To me.”
― Kristen Simmons, quote from Article 5
“They were astonished at what he had to tell them of human history—of war, slavery and prostitution. “It is because they have no Oyarsa,” said one of the pupils. “It is because every one of them wants to be a little Oyarsa himself,” said Augray.”
― C.S. Lewis, quote from Out of the Silent Planet
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Practice Makes Perfe...BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
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