Grafton Quotes

Ghosts don't haunt us. That's not how it works. They're present among us because we won't let go of them.

Ideas are easy. It's the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats.

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

Thinking is hard work, which is why you don't see many people doing it.

You can’t save others from themselves because those who make a perpetual muddle of their lives don’t appreciate your interfering with the drama they’ve created. They want your poor-sweet-baby sympathy, but they don’t want to change.

I love being single. It's almost like being rich.

I think I can live without you, but it won't be any kind of life.

Beware the dark pool at the bottom of our hearts. In its icy, black depths dwell strange and twisted creatures it is best not to disturb.

It's disconcerting to realize how little you have to say to someone who once occupied such a prominent place in your bed.

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

I know there are people who believe you should forgive and forget. For the record, I'd like to say I'm a big fan of forgiveness as long as I'm given the opportunity to get even first.

There's a certain class of people who will do you in and then remain completely mystified by the depth of your pain.

Ghosts don't haunt us. That's not how it works. They're present among us because we won't let go of them." "I don't believe in ghosts," I said, faintly. "Some people can't see the color red. That doesn't mean it isn't there," she replied.

The hard thing about death is that nothing ever changes. The hard thing about life is that nothing stays the same.

Everything happens for a reason, but that doesn't mean there's a point.

Except for cases that clearly involve a homicidal maniac, the police like to believe murders are committed by those we know and love, and most of the time they're right - a chilling thought when you sit down to dinner with a family of five. All those potential killers passing their plates.

Pretending to be 'normal' is a lot harder than you think.

Personally, I'd rather grow old alone than in the company of anyone I've met so far. I don't experience myself as lonely, incomplete, or unfulfilled, but I don't talk about that much. It seems to piss people off--especially men. (Kinsey Millhone)

Insecure people have a special sensitivity for anything that finally confirms their own low opinion of themselves.

Lucky is the spouse who dies first, who never has to know what survivors endure.

To many women mistake a man's hostility for wit and his silence for depth.

Smile. It gives your face something to do.

You try to keep life simple but it never works, and in the end all you have left is yourself.

It's pitiful to have a life in which junk food is awarded the same high status as sex.

A woman should never, never, never be financially dependent to anyone, especially a man, because the minute you were dependent, you could be abused.

In my opinion, there's no condition in life that can't be ameliorated by a dose of junk food.

You never know which people will affect your life.

What could smell better than supper being cooked by someone else?

If you're unhappy, change something.

There are days when none of us can bear it, but the good comes around again. Happiness is seasonal, like anything else. Wait it out. There are people who love you. People who can help.

Sometimes being fooled by love is worth the price. At least you know you're alive and capable of feeling, even if all you end up with is chest pain.

All of us are subjected to somebody else's power at some point. So once in a while you kiss ass. So what? Either you make your peace with that early, or you end up living your life as a crank and a misfit.

We all need to look into the dark side of our nature -- that’s where the energy is, the passion. People are afraid of that because it holds pieces of us we’re busy denying.

Missing someone is a vague, unpleasant sensation, like gnawing anxiety. It isn't as concrete as grief, but it's just as pervasive and there's no escaping it.

The truth isn't always nice. It isn't always small enough to absorb at once. Sometimes the truth washes over you and threatens to take you right down with it.

He might be a man without character, but she was a woman without courage. Of the two, which was worse?

People get careless when they're feeling safe.

I hate nature. I really do. Nature is composed entirely of sticks, dirt, fall-down places, biting and stinging things, and savageries too numerous to list. And I'm not the only one who feels this way. Man has been building cities since the year oughty-ought, just to get away from this stuff.

We all do things we regret. It's part of growing up.

Life is hard. Life hurts. So what? You tough it out. You get through and then you'll feel good again.

Grief is as contagious as a yawn.

If I'd been listening closely, I'd have caught the sound of the gods having a great big old tee-hee at my expense.

The cold hard truth will fall on stony ground, whereas your all-around trashy rumor will flourish like a weed.

There's always something else. That's what makes life so much fun.

Perhaps when we're forced to forfeit what we own, we lose any sentimental associations. Perhaps pawning our valuables frees us in the same way a house fire destroys not only our worldly goods, but our attachment to what's gone.

The critical lessons in life hold sway whether you like it or not.

For now, we live in the mall, but I think it's closing soon.

For the record, I'd like to say that I'm a big fan of forgiveness as long as I have a chance to get even first" Kinsey Millhone, V is for Vengeance

I write letters to my right brain all the time. They're just little notes. And right brain, who likes to get little notes from me, will often come through within a day or two.

Life is simple. You're the one making things complex.

People make mistakes. People do things they never meant to do.

Memory is subject to a filtering process that we don’t always recognize and can’t always control. We remember what we can bear and we block what we cannot.

Life was reduced to its four basic elements: air, food, drink, and a good friend.

You can't believe everything you hear. Sometimes, you can't even believe your eyes.

So much of the past in encapsulated in the odds and ends. Most of us discard more information about ourselves than we ever care to preserve. Our recollection of the past is not simply distorted by our faulty perception of events remembered but skewed by those forgotten. The memory is like twin orbiting stars, one visible, one dark, the trajectory of what's evident forever affected by the gravity of what's concealed.

I don't know what is love about and I'm not sure I believe in it anyway.

Too much virtue has a corrupting effect.

I like difficulty. It's what makes my job fun.

If love is what injures us, how can we heal?

Pain was better than anxiety any day of the week and sweat was better than depression.

At this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured. On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war--seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came. One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war, while the Government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether." With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

I didn't join the army to shoot Americans. If I wanted to shoot Americans I'd have joined the police.

Built into bad news is that sense of profound disbelief. The mind struggles to absorb the bare facts, defending itself against the larger implications.

You can’t make someone else do anything, even if you know you’re right.

I think you'd best make your peace with the past since you've come this far. I think you know by now that you won't go back again.

You kill people you hate or you kill in rage or you kill to get even, but you don't kill someone you're indifferent to.

People can hold out just so long and then they fold.

You don't have to justify yourself to me. You did what you did.

These are the days that require discipline, when exercise is pure duty and the good feeling only comes later, consisting solely of self-congratulations for having done the job at all.

Verbal clashes seldom come to a satisfying end. They peter out in weak retorts that leave you wishing you’d been as clever in the moment as you are in reviewing the conversation later.

Whatever the surface appearances, most human beings come equipped with convoluted emotional machinery. With intimacy, the wreckage starts to show, damage rendered in the course of passions colliding like freight trains on the same track.

About every six to eight months, I run into a man who astounds me sexually, but between escapades, I'm celibate, which I don't think is any big deal. After two unsuccessful marriages, I find myself keeping my guard up, along with my underpants.

The Latin term pro bono, as most attorneys will attest, roughly translated means for boneheads and applies to work done without charge.

I've never been a big fan of exercise. I just can't think of any other way to feel good." Kinsey Milhone

While I'm not a big fan of nature, its intractability amuses me to no end. (Kinsey Millhone)

I did an about-face and veered into the sandwich shop. What I ordered is none of your business, but it was really good.

Death is insulting, and I resented its sudden appearance, like an unannounced visit from a boorish relative.

I did discover that if you're interested in low wages, a bookstore ranks below retail clothing sales, except the hours are worse.

I love being single. It's almost like being rich.

I figure guys are like Whitman's Samplers. I like to take a little bite out of each and then move on before the whole box gets stale.

...He has all the uncanny intuitions of a psychopath. Have you ever dealt with one? It's almost like a form of mind-reading...

To distract myself, I thought about all the cusswords I knew and arranged them in alphabetical order.

Well, I won't. Ludovic Speed and Theodora Dix live in Middle Grafton and Mrs. Rachel says he has been courting her for a hundred years. Won't they soon be too old to get married, Anne? I hope Gilbert won't court YOU that long. When are you going to be married, Anne? Mrs. Lynde says it's a sure thing." "Mrs. Lynde is a—" began Anne hotly; then stopped. "Awful old gossip," completed Davy calmly. "That's what every one calls her. But is it a sure thing, Anne? I want to know." "You're

I thought I'd go home and reread Sue Grafton. It's been a while since I last read the one about the topless dancer who gets poison injected into one of her implants." "'D' Is For Cup." "Right. Bern, you know what I wish? I wish she didn't have to stop at twenty-six. When the alphabet's used up, what happens to Kinsey?" "Are you kidding? She goes straight into doublé letters. 'AA' Is For drunks, 'BB' Is For Gun, 'CC' Is For Rider. There was a whole list in Publishers Weekly a few months back. 'PP' Is For Golden Showers, 'ZZ' Is For Topp- I can't remember them all, but it looks as though she can go on forever." "Bern, that's wonderful news." "You'll be reading about Kinsey fifty years from now," I told her. "'AAA' Is for Motorists, 'MMM' Is for Scotch Tape. You'll never have to stop.

He looked like an actor who'd star in some movie about a doomed love affair between an heiress and a park ranger. I thought it was probably inappropriate to fling myself against him and bury my nose in his chest.

I showered and shampooed. I even shaved the requisite legs and armpits just in case I fell in a swoon and one or the other was exposed to view. (Kinsey Millhone)

She was the type who went to bars intent on conversation, while he was the type who went in hopes of being left alone.

The world is full of talented people.

Sometimes the noes are just as important as the yeses because they represent cul-de-sacs, allowing you to narrow your field of inquiry until you stumble into the heart of the maze.

You can believe anything you like.

Some people die accidentally. It's a fact.

a book has no unwanted calories and you don’t have to worry about sizes as long as the subject matter appeals to the recipient.

I’m not cute at all. I’m a very cranky person.

Growing up had made her crabby, which happens to the best of us.

Emotion doesn't travel in a straight line. Like water, our feelings trickle down through cracks and crevices, seeking out the little pockets of neediness and neglect, the hairline fractures in our character usually hidden from public view. Beware the dark pool at the bottom of our hearts. In its icy, black depths dwell strange and twisted creatures it is best not to disturb.

I wish life could be edited as deftly as prose. It would be nice to go back and write a better story, correcting weaknesses and follies in the light of what I now know. What I've noticed though is that any attempt to trim out the dark matter takes away some of the good that was also buried in the muck. The past is a package deal and I don't believe there's a way to tell some of the truth without telling most.Wisdom comes at a price, and I have paid dearly for mine.

It is a confounding and eerie sensation to feel social while alone, thronged with invisible entities whose presence is felt yet who appear wholly absent. These entities are our twenty-first-century ghosts, shorn from their corporeal shells and set loose to glide through cyberspace at lightning speed and with startling precision. We call to one another in the darkness of the Internet, reuniting with hosts of friends and followers, but the act is all theater. There is nothing there in the dark except the dead gaze of a copy.

I thought about the current contamination of beaches, raw sewage spilling into oceans and streams, the hole in the ozone, forests being stripped, the toxic-waste dumps, the merry plunder of mankind added to the drought and the famine that nature dishes up annually as a matter of course. It's hard to know what's actually going to get us first. Sometimes I think we should just blow the whole planet and get it over with. It's the suspense that's killing me.

All that night, after I shut the door and left Number 16 empty, I went looking for the parts of my city that have lasted. I walked down streets that got their names in the Middle Ages: Copper Alley, Fishamble Street, Blackpitts where the plague dead were buried. I looked for cobblestones worn smooth and iron railings gone thin with rust. I ran my hand over the cool stone of Trinity’s walls and I crossed the spot where nine hundred years ago the town got its water from Patrick’s Well; the street sign still tells you so, hidden in the Irish that no one ever reads. I paid no attention to the shoddy new apartment blocks and the neon signs, the sick illusions ready to fall into brown mush like rotten fruit. They’re nothing; they’re not real. In a hundred years they’ll be gone, replaced and forgotten. This is the truth of bombed-out ruins: hit a city hard enough and the cheap arrogant veneer will crumble faster than you can snap your fingers; it’s the old stuff, the stuff that’s endured, that might just keep enduring. I tilted my head up to see the delicate, ornate columns and balustrades above Grafton Street’s chain stores and fast-food joints. I leaned my arms on the Ha’penny Bridge where people used to pay half a penny to cross the Liffey, I looked out at the Custom House and the shifting streams of lights and the steady dark roll of the river under the falling snow, and I hoped to God that somehow or other, before it was too late, we would all find our way back home.

The Copse at Hurstbourne is one of those fancy-sounding titles for a brand-new tract of condominiums on the outskirts of town. 'Copse' as in 'a thicket of small trees.' 'Hurst' as in 'hillock, knoll, or mound.' And 'bourne' as in 'brook or stream.' All of these geological and botanical wonders did seem to conjoin within the twenty parcels of the development, but it was hard to understand why it couldn't have just been called Shady Acres, which is what it was. Apparently people aren't willing to pay a hundred and fifty thousand dollars for a home that doesn't sound like it's part of an Anglo-Saxon land grant. These often quite utilitarian dwellings are never named after Jews or Mexicans. Try marketing Rancho Feinstein if you want to lose money in a hurry. Or Paco Sanchez Park. Middle-class Americans aspire to tone, which is equated, absurdly, with the British gentry.