“Summer lightning made it seem that flickering white-hot wires were turning in the terribly blue sky just above the horizon, and the recent storms had driven in toward shore hundreds of gigantic Portuguese man-o'-wars that now hung below the surface of the water like big malignant pearls.”
― Tim Powers, quote from The Stress of Her Regard
“Byron had drawn his pistol, and was looking closely at the leaves and dirt around him, as if he'd dropped something. "It's -- do keep calm now -- it's right over your head. I suppose you could look, if you can do it slowly."
Crawford felt drops of sweat run down his ribs under his shirt as he slowly forced the muscles of his neck to tilt his head up; he saw the upper slope, bristling with trees that obstructed a view of the road, and then he saw the outer branches of the tree he was braced against, and finally he gathered his tattered courage and looked straight up.
And it took all of his self-control not to recoil or scream, and he was distantly resentful that he couldn't just die in this instant.”
― Tim Powers, quote from The Stress of Her Regard
“Is this Christian charity as it’s practiced in Bern?” He stood up, rapping his head against the low ceiling. “The Church has become a more … exclusive club since the founder’s day, it’s clear. No doubt the Devil is more hospitable.”
― Tim Powers, quote from The Stress of Her Regard
“Newton must have been right when he’d said that light consisted of particles, for today he could feel them hitting him.”
― Tim Powers, quote from The Stress of Her Regard
“Byron; and, realistically, quite a number of those infants will die without my care, and Josephine is hardly a creature with potential, hardly anybody’s idea of a tabula rasa, a blank slate—hell, she’s a slate that’s had bad math scrawled on it and then been waxed so that nothing can ever be written on it again. I’ve treated sheep that had more of a right to live.”
― Tim Powers, quote from The Stress of Her Regard
“When you have lived your individual life in your own adventurous way and then look back upon its course, you will find that you have lived a model human life, after all.”
― Joseph Campbell, quote from Thou Art That: Transforming Religious Metaphor
“You are America. Yes, you are, my wicked boy. When we flew to New York and drove in on the highway, whatever the highway is, and those graveyards that are surrounded by cars and the traffic, and that was very confusing and frightening to me. I said to Matija, 'I don't like this'. I was crying. Motorized America with all the endless cars that never stop, and then, suddenly, the place of rest is between that. And they are thrown a little here and a little there. It's so very scary to me, so extremely opposite and different that I couldn't understand it. Through you it is all different now. Do you know? Through you I can think of those stones with understading now. I only wish now I went places with you. I was wishing today, all day, thinking of the places."
"Which places?"
"To where you were born. I would have liked to go to the Jersey shore."
"We should have gone. I should have taken you."
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda. The three blind mice.
"Even to New York City. To show it to me through your eyes. I would have liked that. Wherever we went, we always went to hide. I hate hiding. I wouldn't mind to go to New Mexico with you. To California with you. But mainly to New Jersey, to see the sea where you grew up."
"I understand." Too late, but I understand. That we don't perish of understanding everything too late, that is a miracle.”
― Philip Roth, quote from Sabbath's Theater
“...I made some more threats. I've got this big knife back here." He poked his thumb over his shoulder. "It attracts a lot of attention sometimes.”
― David Eddings, quote from The Seeress of Kell
“But having more freedom she only became more profoundly aware of the big want. She wanted so many things. She wanted to read great, beautiful books, and be rich with them; she wanted to see beautiful things, and have the joy of them for ever; she wanted to know big, free people; and there remained always the want she could put no name to?
It was so difficult. There were so many things, so much to meet and surpass. And one never knew where one was going.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow
“Deberás ser fuerte y tener fe en ti mismo. Nunca admitas la derrota, aunque te parezca inevitable.”
― Darren Shan, quote from Vampire Mountain
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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