“
I ask people why they have deer heads on their walls. They always say because it's such a beautiful animal. There you go. I think my mother is attractive, but I have photographs of her.
”
”
Ellen DeGeneres
“
Women are the bloodthirsty sex," said Ric sadly. "We get the reputation, but it is only because the women stand behind us, and say, 'Kill it. Squish it.
”
”
Patricia Briggs (Hunting Ground (Alpha & Omega, #2))
“
I am thinking of beauty again, how some things are hunted because we have deemed them beautiful. If, relative to the history of our planet, an individual life is so short, a blink, as they say, then to be gorgeous, even from the day you're born to the day you die, is to be gorgeous only briefly.
”
”
Ocean Vuong (On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous)
“
All right, so give me some idea of what you can do," says Haymitch.
I can’t do anything," says Peeta, "unless you count baking bread."
Sorry, I don’t. Katniss. I already know you’re handy with a knife,” says Haymitch.
Not really. But I can hunt,” I say. “With a bow and arrow.”
And you’re good?” asks Haymitch.
I have to think about it. I’ve been putting food on the table for four years. That’s no small task. I’m not as good as my father was, but he’d had more practice. I’ve better aim than Gale, but I’ve had more practice. He’s a genius with traps and snares. “I’m all right,” I say.
”
”
Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1))
“
Women often seemed to leave things unsaid, and in his limited experience it was what they did not say that proved the most trouble.
”
”
Robert Jordan (The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time, #2))
“
I heard what you said.' Pump, pump, pump went his powerful arms. 'What you waiting to admit until I was almost dead, you fucking coward.' His lightening surged into her, sending her body arcing off the ground as he tried to jump-start her heart. He snarled in her ear, 'Now come say it to my face.
”
”
Sarah J. Maas (House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City, #1))
“
If you die before you say her name, ser, I will hunt you through all seven hells." --Prince Oberyn of Dorne.
”
”
George R.R. Martin (A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3))
“
I felt a little guilty about jangling the poor bugger's brains with that evil fantasy. But what the hell? Anybody who wanders around the world saying, "Hell yes, I'm from Texas," deserves whatever happens to him.
”
”
Hunter S. Thompson (The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time (The Gonzo Papers, #1))
“
I say we try it,' says Peeta. 'Katniss is right.'
Finnick looks at Johanna and raises his eyebrows. He will not go forward without her. 'All right,' she says finally. 'It's better than hunting them down in the jungle, anyway. And I doubt they'll figure out our plan, since we can barely understand it ourselves.
”
”
Suzanne Collins (Catching Fire (The Hunger Games, #2))
“
Our mouths are touching the same spot,” she says shakily. “Does that count as kissing?”
“You tell me, little mouse. When I make you cry out for God, does that count as praying?
”
”
H.D. Carlton (Hunting Adeline (Cat and Mouse, #2))
“
You're a pretty cool customer, huh?" says Agent Hunt.
"I hide my inner pain under my stoic visage."
Agent Hunt looks like he would like to put his fist through my stoic visage.
”
”
Holly Black (Red Glove (Curse Workers, #2))
“
He found himself thinking that maybe stories don't just make us matter to each other - maybe they're also the only way to the infinite mattering he'd been after for so long.
And Colin thought: Because like say I tell someone about my feral hog hunt. Even if it's a dumb story, telling it changes other people just the slightest little bit, just as living the story changes me. An infinitesimal change. And that infinitesimal change ripples outward - ever smaller but everlasting. I will get forgotten, but the stories will last. And so we all matter - maybe less than a lot, but always more than some.
”
”
John Green (An Abundance of Katherines)
“
But you've been too busy saving the Wizarding world. Well ... I can't say I'm surprised. I knew this would happen in the end. I knew you wouldn't be happy unless you were hunting Voldemort. Maybe that's why I like you so much.
”
”
J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6))
“
There is a crucifix, a few cloves of garlic, a wooden stake, a hammer, a blob of Silly Putty, and a pocketknife. “You do realize these people aren’t vampires, right?” I say when Sam walks back in. “Yeah, but you never know. They’re probably crazy, like you said.” “And even if we were hunting vampires, what the hell is the Silly Putty for?” He shrugs. “Just want to be prepared.
”
”
Pittacus Lore (I Am Number Four (Lorien Legacies, #1))
“
Let me tell you about love, that silly word you believe is about whether you like somebody or whether somebody likes you or whether you can put up with somebody in order to get something or someplace you want or you believe it has to do with how your body responds to another body like robins or bison or maybe you believe love is how forces or nature or luck is benign to you in particular not maiming or killing you but if so doing it for your own good. Love is none of that. There is nothing in nature like it. Not in robins or bison or in the banging tails of your hunting dogs and not in blossoms or suckling foal. Love is divine only and difficult always. If you think it is easy you are a fool. If you think it is natural you are blind. It is a learned application without reason or motive except that it is God. You do not deserve love regardless of the suffering you have endured. You do not deserve love because somebody did you wrong. You do not deserve love just because you want it. You can only earn - by practice and careful contemplations - the right to express it and you have to learn how to accept it. Which is to say you have to earn God. You have to practice God. You have to think God-carefully. And if you are a good and diligent student you may secure the right to show love. Love is not a gift. It is a diploma. A diploma conferring certain privileges: the privilege of expressing love and the privilege of receiving it. How do you know you have graduated? You don't. What you do know is that you are human and therefore educable, and therefore capable of learning how to learn, and therefore interesting to God, who is interested only in Himself which is to say He is interested only in love. Do you understand me? God is not interested in you. He is interested in love and the bliss it brings to those who understand and share the interest. Couples that enter the sacrament of marriage and are not prepared to go the distance or are not willing to get right with the real love of God cannot thrive. They may cleave together like robins or gulls or anything else that mates for life. But if they eschew this mighty course, at the moment when all are judged for the disposition of their eternal lives, their cleaving won't mean a thing. God bless the pure and holy. Amen.
”
”
Toni Morrison (Paradise (Beloved Trilogy, #3))
“
Did she cry out for God?” he pushes. “Yes,” Xavier spits, and fuck, I’m falling apart. I thrust against Zade’s hand, rolling my hips mindlessly, the bliss eroding my entire being. “Good,” he says, a grin in his voice. “That means she was crying out for me.
”
”
H.D. Carlton (Hunting Adeline (Cat and Mouse, #2))
“
I say you are a coward and you are; I think you hunt only to reassure yourself that you are not what you are: the weakest thing to ever walk the Earth. He will come for me and then we will be gone, and you will be helpless for all your hunting, because Westley and I are joined by the bond of love and you cannot track that, not with a thousand bloodhounds, and you cannot break it, not with a thousand swords.
”
”
William Goldman (The Princess Bride)
“
Maybe we can relax here for a few seconds,” says Little B. “Oops, time’s up,” says Howler, slapping his hand on Little B’s shoulder. “Back to being tense and hunted.
”
”
Susan Ee (End of Days (Penryn & the End of Days, #3))
“
And although I have seen nothing but black crows in my life, it doesn't mean that there's no such thing as a white crow. Both for a philosopher and for a scientist it can be important not to reject the possibility of finding a white crow. You might almost say that hunting for 'the white crow' is science's principal task.
”
”
Jostein Gaarder (Sophie’s World)
“
They say hunting monsters will turn you into one. That isn’t what’s happening now. Sometimes to kill a dragon, you have to remember that you breath fire too. This isn’t a becoming; its a revealing. I’ve been a monster all along.
”
”
Micaiah Johnson (The Space Between Worlds (The Space Between Worlds, #1))
“
You could say I'm on the troubleshooting squad."
"Troubleshooting?"
He put a hand on the back of his waistband. "I see trouble and I shoot it.
”
”
Karen Chance (Hunt the Moon (Cassandra Palmer, #5))
“
My life is very monotonous," the fox said. "I hunt chickens: men hunt me. All the chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And, in consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain fields down yonder? [...] The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back to the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wheat in the wind...
”
”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
“
I'll have to introduce you by saying, 'He's not always this grumpy. Then again, he's one of those people who talks less and murders more'.
”
”
Hafsah Faizal (We Hunt the Flame (Sands of Arawiya, #1))
“
Teresa, Teresa. Have we taught you nothing?" Raffy says in an irritated voice. "It's war. You go in and you hunt him down until he realises that he's made a mistake.
”
”
Melina Marchetta (On the Jellicoe Road)
“
His mother used to say that a person without hope was a body without a soul.
”
”
Hafsah Faizal (We Hunt the Flame (Sands of Arawiya, #1))
“
I love you, Zade. Sometimes I can’t fucking stand it,” I say, my voice raspy and uneven. “But it was the only thing that kept me alive. You saved me. Even when we were apart, you saved me. And I hope to God you never stop hunting me.
”
”
H.D. Carlton (Hunting Adeline (Cat and Mouse, #2))
“
Stories are the wildest things of all, the monster rumbled. Stories chase and bite and hunt.
That's what teachers always say, Conor said. No one believes them either.
”
”
Patrick Ness (A Monster Calls)
“
There are two kinds of anger: hot and cold. Boys and girls experience both, but as they grow up the anger separates according to the sex. Boys need hot anger to survive. They need inclination to fight, the drive to sink the knife into the flesh, the energy and initiative of fury. It's a requirement of hunting, of defense, of pride. Maybe of sex too. And girls need cold anger. They need the cold simmer, the ceaseless grudge, the talent to avoid forgiveness, the sidestepping of compromise. They need to know when they say something that they will never back down, ever, ever. It's the compensation for a more limited scope in the world. Cross a man and you struggle, one of you wins, you would adjust and go on -- or you lie there dead. Cross a woman and the universe is changed, once again, for cold anger requires an eternal vigilance in all matters of slight and offense.
”
”
Gregory Maguire (Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (The Wicked Years, #1))
“
You say that you'll grow up to be nobody. But logically.. if nobody's perfect... well then, you must be perfect.
”
”
Lynda Mullaly Hunt (Fish in a Tree)
“
You will say good-bye for all the right reasons. You're tired of living in wait for his apocalypse. You have your own fight on your hands, and though it's no bigger or more noble than his, it will require all of your energy.
It's you who has to hold on to earth. You have to tighten your grip -- which means letting go of him.
”
”
Melissa Bank (The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing)
“
...called nine-one-one," Howie was saying, "and then I heard something in the alleyway, so I went back there and" --Howie coughed-- "and valiantly attacked his knife with my guts, to no avail."
"Did you get a good look at him? Could you describe him?"
Howie smiled wanly. "Yeah. He was about yay long" --he held up his hands, four inches apart-- "thin, made of steel. Pointy. Sharp.
”
”
Barry Lyga (I Hunt Killers (I Hunt Killers, #1))
“
Somewhere
someone
thinks they love
someone else
exactly like
I
love you.
Somewhere
someone shakes
from the ripple
of a thousand butterflies
inside a
single stomach.
Somewhere
someone
is packing their
bags
to see the world
with someone
else.
Somewhere
someone
is reaching through
the most
terrifying few
feet of space
to hold the
hand
of someone
else.
Somewhere
someone
is watching
someone else’s
chest
rise and fall
with the
breath
of slumber.
Somewhere
someone
is pouring
ink like blood
onto pages
fighting
to say the truth
that has
no words.
Somewhere
someone
is waiting
patient
but exhausted
to just
be
with someone
else.
Somewhere
someone
is opening
their eyes
to a sunrise
in someplace
they have never
seen.
Somewhere
someone
is pulling out
the petals
twisting the
apple stem
picking up
the heads up penny
rubbing the
rabbits foot
knocking on
wood
throwing
coins into
fountains
hunting for
the only clover
with only 4 leaves
skipping over
the cracks
snapping the
wishbone
crossing their
fingers
blowing out
the candles
sending dandelion
seeds into the
air
ushering eyelashes
off their thumbs
finding the first
star
and waiting for
11:11 on
their clock
to spend their
wishes
on someone
else.
Somewhere
someone
is saying
goodbye
but somewhere
someone else
is saying
hello.
Somewhere
someone
is sharing their first
or their last
kiss
with their
or no longer their
someone
else.
Somewhere
someone
is wondering
if how they feel
is how the other
they
feels about them
and if both theys
could ever become
a they
together.
Somewhere
someone
is the decoder ring
to all of
the great mysteries
of life
for someone
else.
Somewhere
someone
is the treasure map.
Somewhere
someone
thinks they love
someone else
exactly like
I
love you.
Somewhere
someone
is wrong.
”
”
Tyler Knott Gregson
“
Walk with me, hand in hand through the neon and styrofoam. Walk the razor blades and the broken hearts. Walk the fortune and the fortune hunted. Walk the chop suey bars and the tract of stars.
I know I am a fool, hoping dirt and glory are both a kind of luminous paint; the humiliations and exaltations that light us up. I see like a bug, everything too large, the pressure of infinity hammering at my head. But how else to live, vertical that I am, pressed down and pressing up simultaneously? I cannot assume you will understand me. It is just as likely that as I invent what I want to say, you will invent what you want to hear. Some story we must have. Stray words on crumpled paper. A weak signal into the outer space of each other.
The probability of separate worlds meeting is very small. The lure of it is immense. We send starships. We fall in love.
”
”
Jeanette Winterson (Gut Symmetries)
“
In the Soviet Union every worker is a government worker, and they have a saying: As long as the bosses pretend to pay us, we will pretend to work.
”
”
Tom Clancy (The Hunt for Red October (Jack Ryan, #3))
“
Her, cheer up. Zoey's grandma didn't say the Raven Mockers actually ate people. She said they just picked them up with their humongous beaks and threw them against a wall or whatever over and over again until every bone in their body was broken." - Aphrodite LaFonte
”
”
P.C. Cast (Hunted (House of Night, #5))
“
Manchee comes outta the bushes and sits down next to me cuz I’ve stopped right there in the middle of a trail. He looks around to see what I might be seeing and then he says, ”Good poo, Todd.”
”I’m sure it was, Manchee.”
I’d better not get another ruddy dog when my birthday comes. What I want this year is a hunting knife like the one Ben carries on the back of his belt. Now that’s a present for a man.
“Poo,” Manchee’s says quietly.
”
”
Patrick Ness (The Knife of Never Letting Go (Chaos Walking, #1))
“
A student once asked anthropologist Margaret Mead, “What is the earliest sign of civilization?” The student expected her to say a clay pot, a grinding stone, or maybe a weapon.
Margaret Mead thought for a moment, then she said, “A healed femur.”
A femur is the longest bone in the body, linking hip to knee. In societies without the benefits of modern medicine, it takes about six weeks of rest for a fractured femur to heal. A healed femur shows that someone cared for the injured person, did their hunting and gathering, stayed with them, and offered physical protection and human companionship until the injury could mend.
Mead explained that where the law of the jungle—the survival of the fittest—rules, no healed femurs are found. The first sign of civilization is compassion, seen in a healed femur.
”
”
Ira Byock
“
I’m going to learn to sail.”
Kaz’s brow furrowed, and he cast her a surprised glance. “Really? Why?”
“I want to use my money to hire a crew and outfit a ship.” Saying the words wrapped her breath up in an anxious spool. Her dream still felt fragile. She didn’t want to care what Kaz thought, but she did. “I’m going to hunt slavers.”
“Purpose,” he said thoughtfully. “You know you can’t stop them all.”
“If I don’t try, I won’t stop any.”
“Then I almost pity the slavers,” Kaz said. “They have no idea what’s coming for them.
”
”
Leigh Bardugo (Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1))
“
I drank some too-hot coffee and scowled at him, annoyed although I couldn't remember why. The light from the lounge was leaking in, highlighting his spiky blond hair. I decided that must be it.
"You really hate my hair, don't you?" he asked, a smile flickering over his lips so fast I might have imagined it.
"Yeah"
"Why?"
I reached out to touch it, and was surprised as always to find it mostly soft. Just a little stiff in places from whatever product he used on it. It felt weird, imagining Pritkin having anything in his hair but sweat. But he must have; nobody's did that all on its own.
"It's like...angry hair," I said, trying to pat it down and failing miserably.
He caught my wrist. "Most people would say that suits me."
"I'm not most people."
"I know.
”
”
Karen Chance (Hunt the Moon (Cassandra Palmer, #5))
“
once I gave up the hunt for villains, I had little recourse but to take responsibility for my choices ...Needless to say, this is far less satisfying that nailing villains. It also turned out to be more healing in the end.
”
”
Barbara Brown Taylor
“
Granuaile shook her head. "No, it's gross. You are such a guy sometimes."
Isn't he a guy all the time? (Oberon)
She's not saying I'm occasionally female. She's implying that I'm shallow.
Oh, I know. So why did she say only sometimes? (Oberon)
”
”
Kevin Hearne (Hunted (The Iron Druid Chronicles, #6))
“
Believe me, Alex. I am trying. My fucking bed is too big for me. It feels empty now. I can’t believe I’m even saying that, but whatever. That’s how I feel. I want you back. I want you to move in. I want you with me again.
”
”
Tijan (Broken and Screwed 2 (BS, #2))
“
These enthusiasts often like to hang signs that say "Gone Fishin'" or "Gone Huntin'". But what these slogans really mean is "Gone Killing.
”
”
Marc Bekoff (Animals Matter: A Biologist Explains Why We Should Treat Animals with Compassion and Respect)
“
Take good care of your final word. If your final say will hunt you in day's ahead, then hold back the words, and let silence speak.
”
”
Michael Bassey Johnson
“
Where's your boyfriend, District 12? Still hanging on?" She asks.
Well, as long as we're talking I'm alive. "He's out there now. Hunting Cato," I snarl at her. Then I scream at the top of my lungs. "Peeta!"
Clove jams her fist into my windpipe, very effectively cutting off my voice. But her head's whipping from side to side, and I know for a moment she's at least considering I'm telling the truth. Since no Peeta appears to save me, she turns back to me.
"Liar," she says with a grin. "He's nearly dead. Cato knows where he cut him. You've probably got him strapped up in some tree while you try to keep his heart going. What's in the pretty little backpack? That medicine for Lover Boy? Too bad he'll never get it.
”
”
Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1))
“
We speak now or I do, and others do. You've never spoken before. You will. You'll be able to say how the city is a pit and a hill and a standard and an animal that hunts and a vessel on the sea and the sea and how we are fish in it, not like the man who swims weekly with fish but the fish with which he swims, the water, the pool. I love you, you light me, warm me, you are suns.
You have never spoken before.
”
”
China Miéville (Embassytown)
“
Finally, I sat up. "So, I suppose you should do something, wolfie. Hunt maybe?"
A grunt, the tone saying no.
"Run? Get some exercise?"
Another grunt, less decisive, more like a maybe.
He pushed to his feet, wobbly, still adjusting to his new center of gravity. He gingerly moved one fore paw, then the next, one rear paw, then the other. He picked up the pace, but still slow as he circled the clearing. A snort, like he'd figured it out, and broke into a lope, stumbled and plowed muzzle first into the undergrowth.
I stifled a laugh, but not very well, and he glowered at me.
"Forget running, a nice, leisurely stroll might be more your speed."
He snorted and turned fast. When I fell back, he gave a growling chuckle.
"Still cant resist throwing your weight around, can you?
”
”
Kelley Armstrong
“
Who cares what some numpty thinks?
The thing about numpties, Mog, is that they can always find plenty of other numpties to believe their numpty nonsense. You know what they say: you're never more than six feet away from a numpty.
”
”
Jessica Townsend (Hollowpox: The Hunt for Morrigan Crow (Nevermoor, #3))
“
Tomorrow's a hunting day," I say.
"I won't be much of a help with that," Peeta says. "I've never hunted before."
"I'll kill and you cook," I say. "And you can always gather."
"I wish there was some sort of bread bush out there," says Peeta.
”
”
Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1))
“
This maybe the year when we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it—that we are really just a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable.
”
”
Hunter S. Thompson (The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time (The Gonzo Papers, #1))
“
Imagine if we had a food system that actually produced wholesome food. Imagine if it produced that food in a way that restored the land. Imagine if we could eat every meal knowing these few simple things: What it is we’re eating. Where it came from. How it found its way to our table. And what it really cost. If that was the reality, then every meal would have the potential to be a perfect meal. We would not need to go hunting for our connection to our food and the web of life that produces it. We would no longer need any reminding that we eat by the grace of nature, not industry, and that what we’re eating is never anything more or less than the body of the world. I don’t want to have to forage every meal. Most people don’t want to learn to garden or hunt. But we can change the way we make and get our food so that it becomes food again—something that feeds our bodies and our souls. Imagine it: Every meal would connect us to the joy of living and the wonder of nature. Every meal would be like saying grace.
”
”
Michael Pollan (The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals)
“
Freuchen tells how one day, after coming home hungry from an unsuccessful walrus-hunting expedition, he found one of the successful hunters dropping off several hundred pounds of meat. He thanked him profusely. The man objected indignantly:
"Up in our country we are human!" said the hunter. "And since we are human we help each other. We don't like to hear anybody say thanks for that. What I get today you may get tomorrow. Up here we say that by gifts one makes slaves and by whips one makes dogs.
... The refusal to calculate credits and debits can be found throughout the anthropological literature on egalitarian hunting societies. Rather than seeing himself as human because he could make economic calculations, the hunter insisted that being truly human meant refusing to make such calculations, refusing to measure or remember who had given what to whom, for the precise reason that doing so would inevitably create a world where we began "comparing power with power, measuring, calculating" and reducing each other to slaves or dogs through debt. It's not that he, like untold millions of similar egalitarian spirits throughout history, was unaware that humans have a propensity to calculate. If he wasn't aware of it, he could not have said what he did. Of course we have a propensity to calculate. We have all sorts of propensities. In any real-life situation, we have propensities that drive us in several different contradictory directions simultaneously. No one is more real than any other. The real question is which we take as the foundation of our humanity, and therefore, make the basis of our civilization.
”
”
David Graeber (Debt: The First 5,000 Years)
“
She approaches me slowly. “Let’s run some scenarios. What do you do when a man asks you to get on your knees for him?”
“Get on my knees,” I answer, my voice hoarse.
“And when he tells you to unfasten his pants and take out his cock?”
“Do as he says.”
She nods, studying me closely.
“And then what?”
Bite his dick off.
”
”
H.D. Carlton (Hunting Adeline (Cat and Mouse, #2))
“
It's like this," he'd explained once to Connie. "If someone gave you a single rose, you'd be happy, right?"
"Okay," he went on, "Now imagine someone gives you ten thousand roses."
"That is a whole lotta roses," she said. "That's too much."
"Right. Too much. But more than that, it makes each individual rose much less special, right? It makes it hard to pick one out and say, 'That's the good one.' And it makes you want to just get rid of them all because none of them seem special now."
Connie had narrowed her eyes. "Are you saying when you're at school you just want to get rid of everyone?
”
”
Barry Lyga (I Hunt Killers (I Hunt Killers, #1))
“
It happens the world over - we love ourselves more than we do the one we say we love. We all want to be Number One, we've got to be Number One or nothing! We can't see that we could make ourselves loved and needed in the Number Two, or Three, or Four spot. No sir, we've got to be Number One, and if we can't make it, we'll rip and tear at the loved one till we've ruined every smidgin of love that was ever there.
”
”
Irene Hunt (Up a Road Slowly)
“
I’ll leave you here to finish your, er…conversation.” As he withdrew from the room, however, it seemed that he couldn’t keep from ducking his head back in and asking Marcus cryptically, “Once a week, did you say?”
“Close the door behind you,” Marcus said icily, and Hunt obeyed with a smothered sound that sounded suspiciously like laughter.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (It Happened One Autumn (Wallflowers, #2))
“
I let myself feel good for no reason. I let joy happen right there and then, and it's inside me and around me, it's the lights on the road ahead, the clean black of the night, the cold air coming through the window. It's like hearing a song for the first time and being struck by it, haunted by it, wanting to hunt it down and catch it, because the song sums up something you didn't know you wanted to say, giving you chills and goose bumps. But even as you find out what it's called, and you're thinking you'll download it, you've already lost. Because the feeling was right then and there and it's already fading like a dream.
You just have to see those times for what they are: a chance to look down at your life. And when you do, you see it's a skin made up of shiny little moments.
”
”
Kirsty Eagar (Raw Blue)
“
Those look like broken ribs," Hunt said wryly.
"Definitely broken ribs, Athalar," Bryce replied, sitting back on her heels. "And a broken arm, from the way he's cradling it."
"Skull fracture's healed," Hunt observed with equal distance, as if they were on one of his favorite Vanir crime show procedurals. Ithan's eyes flashed again.
"I'm sensing hostility and a good dose of male pride," Bryce said.
"Throw in some stubbornness and I'd say we've got a classic case of stupidity," Hunt answered.
"What the fuck is wrong with you two?" Ithan demanded.
”
”
Sarah J. Maas (House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City, #2))
“
You’re right. You keep saying Jacks is the villain. Yet you just let a man attack me with his pet bird in order to hunt another man down and kill him. You also told my guards—who aren’t very nice, by the way—not to let me leave the castle, despite promising me you’d never lock me up. So, no, I don’t know how much of a threat Lord Jacks is, but I’m starting to see you as one.
”
”
Stephanie Garber (A Curse for True Love (Once Upon a Broken Heart, #3))
“
I’m saying I want shit kept quiet.” She grinned at Ruhn, showing all her white teeth, the expression more savage than amused. “I’m saying if you three morons leak any of this to your Aux buddies or drunken hookups, I am going to be very unhappy.”
Honestly, Hunt would have liked nothing more than to grab some popcorn and a beer, kick back in a chair, and watch her verbally fillet these assholes.
”
”
Sarah J. Maas (House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City, #1))
“
Reed’s face inches closer to mine on the pillow as he says, “Let me try to explain something to you, Evie. All of these years that I have been here, it is as if I have been sleeping. I have to always pretend to be something that I am not—pretend to be human. When I am not pretending to be human, then I am hunting evil, vicious angels who want nothing more than to…” his voice trails off and there is hollowness in his tone that reflects the loneliness of his existence. “But now, I am awake, for the first time in my existence, and not only am I awake, but I feel flames when you are near me. You have changed things for me. There is no reason to pretend around you. If I had to live without you now…now that I know what I have been missing…” The need in his voice makes me want to promise him anything, give him anything, just to fill that void in him. “I cannot go back to sleep, Evie. You are the only thing that makes me want to live. If you leave here, if you ascend to Paradise, or even if you are cast into the abyss, or taken there by the Fallen…I will have to follow you, no matter where you go. Even if I have to pursue you into the dark…if you cease to be, then so will I. You are my sin and my redemption.
”
”
Amy A. Bartol (Inescapable (The Premonition, #1))
“
Where were you? What happened?” I carved a chunk out of another lizard’s face.
“I just took the kids to fight some ghouls,” Curran said.
Oh, so it was fine, then . . . Wait. “You did what?”
He kicked a lizard. It flew into the others like a cannonball. “I called Jim before we left the house to talk about ghouls, and he said they found some in the MARTA tunnels. So I grabbed the kids and did a little hunting.”
I would kill him. “Just so I get it right, Jim calls you and says, ‘Hey, we found a horde of ghouls in the MARTA tunnels,’ and your first thought was, ‘Great, I’ll take the kids’?”
“They had fun.” A careful note crept into his voice. Curran saw the shark fin in the water but wasn’t sure where the bite would be coming from.
“You even took the dog.”
Grendel chose that moment to try to shove past me. I shoved him back into the Guild and he began running back and forth behind us, growling.
“He had fun, too. Look at him. He’s still excited.
”
”
Ilona Andrews (Magic Shifts (Kate Daniels, #8))
“
My advice is really this: what we hear the philosophers saying and what we find in their writings should be applied in our pursuit of the happy life. We should hunt out the helpful pieces of teaching, and the spirited and noble-minded sayings which are capable of immediate practical application—not far-fetched or archaic expressions or extravagant metaphors and figures of speech—and learn them so well that words become works. No one to my mind lets humanity down quite so much as those who study philosophy as if it were a sort of commercial skill and then proceed to live in a quite different manner from the way they tell other people to live.
”
”
Seneca (Letters from a Stoic)
“
I'm fine," I told him tersely.
"Of course you are. You're one of the strongest people I know."
It took me a second to process that, because he'd said it so casually. Like he was talking about the weather or what time it was. Only Pritkin didn't say things like that. His idea of a compliment was a nod and to tell me to do whatever it was I'd just done over again. Like that was usually possible.
But that had sounded suspiciously like a compliment to me.
”
”
Karen Chance (Hunt the Moon (Cassandra Palmer, #5))
“
Tell your masters the Alpha of the Timberwolf Pack says these streets are mine. This city, this territory is mine. If you sell drugs to poison my wolves, I will come for you. If you threaten my Pack, I will come for you. If you break the laws of my Pack land, I will come for you. The challenge is issued. And I will not be as quick as I was with this cur. Now go.
”
”
L.L. Raand (Blood Hunt (Midnight Hunters #2))
“
Nothing's perfect," sighed the fox. "My life is monotonous. I hunt chickens; people hunt me. All chickens are just alike, and all men are just alike. So I'm rather bored. But if you tame me, my life will be filled with sunshine. I'll know the sound of footsteps that will be different from all the rest. Other footsteps send me back underground. Yours will call me out of my burrow like music. And then, look! You see the wheat fields over there? I don't eat bread. For me, wheat is no use whatever. Wheat fields say nothing to me. Which is sad. But you have hair the color of gold. So it will be wonderful, once you've tamed me! The wheat, which is golden, will remind me of you. And I'll love the sound of the wind in the wheat...
”
”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (The Little Prince)
“
Someday you’re gonna realize that no one on this earth will ever love you the way I do. You’ll wish you’d said the words, wish you’d had this moment back. The truth is whether you say them or not I’ll still go on loving you. Even when it hurts, even when I feel it cut me up inside and I bleed…I’ll still love you, but someday…probably sooner than either of us want it to be….someday…I’ll hate you for it.” Raylan’s words are cruel and wonderful at the same time.
”
”
Ashley Jeffery
“
There is no articulate resonance. The common problem, I suppose, is to have more to say than vocabulary and syntax can bear. That is why I am hunting in these desiccated streets. The smoke hides the sky's variety, stains consciousness, covers the holocaust with something safe and insubstantial. It protects from greater flame. It indicates fire, but obscures the source. This is not a useful city. Very little here approaches any eidolon of the beautiful.
”
”
Samuel R. Delany (Dhalgren)
“
I'm starving. When we check into our hotel, let's ask the desk clerk where we can find one of those vast pizzas."
"What are you talking about?"
"Your guidebook says Florence is a city of vast pizzas. Look it up yourself."
"Those are vast piazzas, not pizzas! It means public squares!"
Dan's face fell. "Oh."
Amy sighed. "I honestly thought the clue hunt took the dweeb out of you. No such luck.
”
”
Gordon Korman (The Medusa Plot (39 Clues: Cahills vs. Vespers, #1))
“
Hey Atticus, do me a quick favour before we go? its easy.
Sure. What is it?
Hold Granuailes staff for just a minute. You know, rest it on the ground so that its like a walking stick or something and the top of it is near your right cheek.
Granuaile and I traded weapons to humor him and I stood as instructed.
Thats perfect! Now say this like Sir Ian McKellen I am Atticus the White, and I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.
”
”
Kevin Hearne (Hunted (The Iron Druid Chronicles, #6))
“
The dart is loaded with enough sedative to bring down a—”
“Small elephant?”
He looked at her. “What?”
“You know. In the movies, if they’re going after something dangerous, they always say their tranquilliser darts have enough sedative to bring down a small elephant.”
“What do people have against small elephants?”
“Well, nothing, but—”
“There’s enough sedative in these darts to bring down a werewolf, which is exactly what we’re hunting. Why would we want to bring down an elephant if we’re not hunting elephants?
”
”
Derek Landy (Kingdom of the Wicked (Skulduggery Pleasant, #7))
“
Be careful of the curse that falls on young lovers
Starts so soft and sweet and turns them to hunters
A man who's pure of heart and says his prayers by night
May still become a wolf when the autumn moon is bright
If you could only see the beast you've made of me
I held it in but now it seems you've set it running free
The saints can't help me now, the ropes have been unbound
I hunt for you with bloody feet across the hallow'd ground
”
”
Florence Welch
“
Zade is quiet for a beat. “Happiness is fleeting. All that matters is that they’re living their life the way they want to.” “You believe that?” I ask, facing him. “That happiness is fleeting?” He shrugs, tossing the last bite of his cone into his mouth, and chews as he contemplates something. “Absolutely,” he says finally. “It’s not something solid you can hold on to. It’s vapor in the wind, and all you can do is inhale it when it’s near and hope it comes around again when it blows away.
”
”
H.D. Carlton (Hunting Adeline (Cat and Mouse, #2))
“
I don’t like big weddings.” Her panic is clear. “All those people make me nervous. I’ll mess up the vows and say something inappropriate.”
“It doesn’t have to be big. It can be just the two of us if you want. We can wait until next summer—or the one after if a year isn’t long enough. We can get married up here by a justice of the peace on the end of the dock at sunset. A damn Rastafarian can perform the ceremony if that’s what you want. I don’t care about the wedding part. All I want to be is connected to you in the most significant way possible. I want you as my wife.
”
”
Helena Hunting (Pucked (Pucked, #1))
“
He is quiet and small, he is black
From his ears to the tip of his tail;
He can creep through the tiniest crack
He can walk on the narrowest rail.
He can pick any card from a pack,
He is equally cunning with dice;
He is always deceiving you into believing
That he's only hunting for mice.
He can play any trick with a cork
Or a spoon and a bit of fish-paste;
If you look for a knife or a fork
And you think it is merely misplaced -
You have seen it one moment, and then it is gawn!
But you'll find it next week lying out on the lawn.
And we all say: OH!
Well I never!
Was there ever
A Cat so clever
As Magical Mr. Mistoffelees!
”
”
T.S. Eliot (Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats)
“
Rose,
I’m sorry I had to leave so quickly, but when the Alchemists tell me to jump … well, I jump. I’ve hitched a ride back to that farm town we stayed in so that I can pick up the Red Hurricane, and then I’m off to Saint Petersburg. Apparently, now that you’ve been delivered to Baia, they don’t need me to stick around anymore.
I wish I could tell you more about Abe and what he wants from you. Even if I was allowed to, there isn’t much to say. In some ways, he’s as much a mystery to me as he is to you. Like I said, a lot of the business he deals in is illegal—both among humans and Moroi. The only time he gets directly involved with people is when something relates to that business—or if it’s a very, very special case. I think you’re one of those cases, and even if he doesn’t intend you harm, he might want to use you for his own purposes. It could be as simple as him wanting to contract you as a bodyguard, seeing as you’re rogue. Maybe he wants to use you to get to others. Maybe this is all part of someone else’s plan, someone who’s even more mysterious than him. Maybe he’s doing someone a favor. Zmey can be dangerous or kind, all depending on what he needs to accomplish.
I never thought I’d care enough to say this to a dhampir, but be careful. I don’t know what your plans are now, but I have a feeling trouble follows you around. Call me if there’s anything I can help with, but if you go back to the big cities to hunt Strigoi, don’t leave any more bodies unattended!
All the best,
Sydney
P.S. “The Red Hurricane” is what I named the car.
P.P.S. Just because I like you, it doesn’t mean I still don’t think you’re an evil creature of the night. You are.
”
”
Richelle Mead (Blood Promise (Vampire Academy, #4))
“
What is that?” The question is inane. But, honestly, what the fuck am I supposed to do with this? Alex chuckles nervously. As is appropriate since I’m holding his dick and I’m clearly not sane. “I mean, I know what it is. Obviously. Do you have some kind of . . . disorder? Like elephantiasis of the penis or something?” I did not say that out loud. “It’s not that big.” His erection slides in my grip. I can’t stop staring. My thumb and middle finger must have a good inch or more before they can meet. I squeeze to see if it helps bring them closer together. It doesn’t. What it does is make Alex groan, and that, oh holy monster of cock, is one hot noise.
”
”
Helena Hunting (Pucked (Pucked, #1))
“
Well, what if..." Scarlet listed her head. "You said the control when your animal instincts will overpower your own thoughts right? But fighting and hunting aren't the only instincts wolves have. Aren't wolves...monogamous, for starters?" Her cheeks started to burn and she had to look away, scratching her fork into a set of initial. "And isn't the alpha male the one who's responsible for protecting everyone? Not only the pack, but his mate too?" Dropping the fork, she threw her hands into the air. "I'm not saying I think you and I are--after just--I know we just met and that's...but it's not out of the questions, is it? That your instincts to protect me could be as strong as your instincts to kill?
”
”
Marissa Meyer (Scarlet (The Lunar Chronicles, #2))
“
—but they’re minor-level functionaries. They can’t do that kind of shit. And a demon can’t possess another demon—or a half, for that matter. So two plus two, okay? His other half ain’t Ahhazu, it’s incubus. And there’s only one half human, half incubus ever been recorded—”
“Maybe Pritkin’s birth wasn’t recorded.”
“Bullshit. You know damn well who we got—”
“Don’t say it.”
“—next door, and John Pritkin ain’t his—”
“I’m warning you.”
“—name. It’s motherfucking Mer—”
“Say it and spend the rest of your life in the Jurassic,” I hissed.
”
”
Karen Chance (Hunt the Moon (Cassandra Palmer, #5))
“
I always wondered why the makers leave housekeeping and cooking out of their tales. Isn't it what all the great wars and battles are fought for -- so that at day's end a family may eat together in a peaceful house? The tale tells how the Lords of Manva hunted & gathered roots & cooked their suppers while they were camped in exile in the foothills of Sul, but it doesn't say what their wives & children were living on in their city left ruined & desolate by the enemy. They were finding food too, somehow, cleaning house & honoring the gods, the way we did in the siege & under the tyranny of the Alds. When the heroes came back from the mountain, they were welcomed with a feast. I'd like to know what the food was and how the women managed it.
”
”
Ursula K. Le Guin (Voices (Annals of the Western Shore, #2))
“
That dog is a wolf, is he not?'
'Aye, well, mostly.'
A small flash of hazel told him not to quibble.
'And yet he is thy boon companion, a creature of rare courage and affection, and altogether a worthy being?;
'Oh, aye,' he said with more confidence. 'He is."
She gave him an even look.
'Thee is a wolf, too, and I know it. But thee is my wolf, and best thee know that.'
He'd started to burn when she spoke, an ignition swift and fierce as the lighting of one of his cousin's matches. He put out his hand, palm forward, to her, still cautious lest she too, burst into flame.
'What I said to ye, before . . . that I kent ye loved me-'
She stepped forward and pressed her palm to his, her small, cool fingers linking tight.
'What I say to thee now is that I do love thee. And if thee hunts at night, thee will come home.'
Under the sycamore, the dog yawned and laid his muzzle on his paws.
'And sleep at they feet,' Ian whispered, and gathered her in with his one good arm, both of them blazing bright as day.
”
”
Diana Gabaldon (An Echo in the Bone (Outlander, #7))
“
Always has woman crouched close to earth like a partridge hen mothering her young; always has my wantonness of roving led me out on the shining ways; and always have my star paths returned me to her, the figure everlasting, the woman, the one woman, for whose arms I had such need that clasped in them I have forgotten the stars.
For her I accomplished Odysseys scaled mountains crossed deserts; for her I led the hunt and was forward in battle; and for her end' to her I sang my songs of the things I had done. All ecstasies of life and rhapsodies of delight have been mine because of her. And here, at the end, I can say that I have known no sweeter, deeper madness of being than to drown in the fragrant glory and forgetfulness of her hair.
”
”
Jack London (The Star Rover (Modern Library Classics))
“
There was some sort of commotion going on outside, and I decided I’d had enough. I went to the door and stuck my head out. Marco was gasping for breath on the sofa, and two of the guards were bent over a cell phone.
“What are you doing?” I demanded.
“Trying to record this,” the smart-ass from the shopping trip told me. “Nobody is going to believe us otherwise.”
“Well, cut it out. It isn’t funny!”
“On what planet?”
I glared at him, which did no good,because he simply went back to to tinkering with the phone. So I looked at Marco. “Can’t you do anything with them?”
Marco flopped a hand at me, tears streaming down his reddened cheeks, and tried to say something. But all that came out for several moments were asthmatic wheezes. I bent over his prone form, starting to worry about him, and he put a hand on my neck and pulled me down.
” It…is…funny,” he gasped.
”
”
Karen Chance (Hunt the Moon (Cassandra Palmer, #5))
“
Wilt thou be gone? it is not yet near day:
It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear;
Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree:
Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.
Rom. It was the lark, the herald of the morn,
No nightingale: look, love, what envious streaks
Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east:
Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops:
I must be gone and live, or stay and die.
Jul. Yon light is not daylight, I know it, I:
It is some meteor that the sun exhales,
To be to thee this night a torch-bearer,
And light thee on thy way to Mantua:
Therefore stay yet; thou need'st not to be gone,
Rom. Let me be ta'en,, let me be put to death;
I am content, so thou wilt have it so.
I'll say yon grey is not the morning's eye,
'T is but the pale reflex of Cynthia's brow;
Nor that is not the lark, whose notes do beat
The vaulty heaven so high above our heads:
I have more care to stay than will to go:
Come, death, and welcome! Juliet wills it so,
How is't my soul? let's talk; it is not day.
Jul. It is, it is; hie hence, be gone, away!
It is the lark that sings so out of tune,
Straining harsh discords and unpleasing sharps.
Some say the lark makes sweet division;
This doth not so, for she divideth us:
Some say the lark and loathed toad change eyes;
O! now I would they had changed voices too,
Since arm from arm that voice doth us affray,
Hunting thee hence with hunt's up to the day.
O! now be gone; more light and light it grows.
Rom. More light and light; more dark and dark our woes.
”
”
William Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet)
“
Annabelle, what happened to you?” Lillian asked the next morning. “You look dreadful. Why aren’t you wearing your riding habit? I thought you were going to try out the jumping course this morning. And why did you disappear
so suddenly last night? It’s not like you to simply vanish without saying—”
“I didn’t have a choice in the matter,” Annabelle said testily, folding her fingers around the delicate bowl of a porcelain teacup. Looking pale and exhausted, her blue eyes ringed with dark shadows, she swallowed a mouthful of heavily sweetened tea before continuing. “It was that blasted perfume of yours—as soon as he caught one whiff of it, he went berserk.”
Shocked, Lillian tried to take in the information, her stomach plummeting. “It… it had an effect on Westcliff, then?” she managed to ask.
“Good Lord, not Lord Westcliff.” Annabelle rubbed her weary eyes. “He couldn’t have cared less what I smelled like. It was my husband who went completely mad. After he caught the scent of that stuff, he dragged me up to our room and…well, suffice it to say, Mr. Hunt kept me awake all night. All night ,” she repeated in sullen emphasis, and drank deeply of the tea.
“Doing what?” Daisy asked blankly.
Lillian, who was feeling a rush of relief that Lord Westcliff had not been attracted to Annabelle while she
was wearing the perfume, gave her younger sister a derisive glance. “What do you think they were doing? Playing a few hands of Find-the-Lady?
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (It Happened One Autumn (Wallflowers, #2))
“
I am thinking of beauty again, how some things are hunted because we have deemed them beautiful. If, relative to the history of our planet, an individual life is so short, a blink of an eye, as they say, then to be gorgeous, even from the day you're born to the day you die, is to be gorgeous only briefly. Like right now, how the sun is coming on, low behind the elms, and I can't tell the difference between a sunset and a sunrise. The world, reddening, appears the same to me--and I lose track of east and west. The colors this morning have the frayed tint of something already leaving. I think of the time Trev and I sat on the toolshed roof, watching the sun sink. I wasn't so much surprised by its effect--how, in a few crushed minutes, it changes the way things are seen, including ourselves--but that it was ever mine to see. Because the sunset, like survival, exists only on the verge of its own disappearing. To be gorgeous, you must first be seen, but to be seen allows you to be hunted.
”
”
Ocean Vuong (On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous)
“
I thought how little we know about the feelings of old people. Children we understand, their fears and hopes and make-believe. I was a child yesterday. I had not forgotten. But Maxim’s grandmother, sitting there in her shawl with her poor blind eyes, what did she feel, what was she thinking? Did she know that Beatrice was yawning and glancing at her watch? Did she guess that we had come to visit her because we felt it right, it was a duty, so that when she got home afterwards Beatrice would be able to say, “Well, that clears my conscience for three months”? Did she ever think about Manderley? Did she remember sitting at the dining room table, where I sat? Did she too have tea under the chestnut tree? Or was it all forgotten and laid aside, and was there nothing left behind that calm, pale face of hers but little aches and little strange discomforts, a blurred thankfulness when the sun shone, a tremor when the wind blew cold? I wished that I could lay my hands upon her face and take the years away. I wished I could see her young, as she was once, with color in her cheeks and chestnut hair, alert and active as Beatrice by her side, talking as she did about hunting, hounds, and horses. Not sitting there with her eyes closed while the nurse thumped the pillows behind her head. “We’ve got a treat today, you know,” said the nurse, “watercress sandwiches for tea. We love watercress, don’t we?
”
”
Daphne du Maurier (Rebecca)
“
I would love to say that I wrote (Good Will Hunting). Here is the truth. In my obit it will say that I wrote it. People don't want to think those two cute guys wrote it. What happened was, they had the script. It was their script. They gave it to Rob [Reiner] to read, and there was a great deal of stuff in the script dealing with the F.B.I. trying to use Matt Damon for spy work because he was so brilliant in math. Rob said, "Get rid of it." They then sent them in to see me for a day - I met with them in New York - and all I said to them was, "Rob's right. Get rid of the F.B.I. stuff. Go with the family, go with Boston, go with all that wonderful stuff." And they did. I think people refuse to admit it because their careers have been so far from writing, and I think it's too bad. I'll tell you who wrote a marvelous script once, Sylvester Stallone. Rocky's a marvelous script. God, read it, it's wonderful. It's just got marvelous stuff. And then he stopped suddenly because it's easier being a movie star and making all that money than going in your pit and writing a script. But I did not write [Good Will Hunting], alas. I would not have written the "It's not your fault" scene. I'm going to assume that 148 percent of the people in this room have seen a therapist. I certainly have, for a long time. Hollywood always has this idea that it's this shrink with only one patient. I mean, that scene with Robin Williams gushing and Matt Damon and they're hugging, "It's not your fault, it's not your fault." I thought, Oh God, Freud is so agonized over this scene. But Hollywood tends to do that with therapists.
(from 2003 WGA seminar)
”
”
William Goldman
“
We are not our own any more than what we possess is our own. We did not make ourselves, we cannot be supreme over ourselves. We are not our own masters. We are God's property. Is it not our happiness thus to view the matter? Is it any happiness or any comfort, to consider that we are our own? It may be thought so by the young and prosperous. These may think it a great thing to have everything, as they suppose, their own way–to depend on no one–to have to think of nothing out of sight, to be without the irksomeness of continual acknowledgment, continual prayer, continual reference of what they do to the will of another. But as time goes on, they, as all men, will find that independence was not made for man–that it is an unnatural state–will do for a while, but will not carry us on safely to the end …'" Mustapha Mond paused, put down the first book and, picking up the other, turned over the pages. "Take this, for example," he said, and in his deep voice once more began to read: "'A man grows old; he feels in himself that radical sense of weakness, of listlessness, of discomfort, which accompanies the advance of age; and, feeling thus, imagines himself merely sick, lulling his fears with the notion that this distressing condition is due to some particular cause, from which, as from an illness, he hopes to recover. Vain imaginings! That sickness is old age; and a horrible disease it is. They say that it is the fear of death and of what comes after death that makes men turn to religion as they advance in years. But my own experience has given me the conviction that, quite apart from any such terrors or imaginings, the religious sentiment tends to develop as we grow older; to develop because, as the passions grow calm, as the fancy and sensibilities are less excited and less excitable, our reason becomes less troubled in its working, less obscured by the images, desires and distractions, in which it used to be absorbed; whereupon God emerges as from behind a cloud; our soul feels, sees, turns towards the source of all light; turns naturally and inevitably; for now that all that gave to the world of sensations its life and charms has begun to leak away from us, now that phenomenal existence is no more bolstered up by impressions from within or from without, we feel the need to lean on something that abides, something that will never play us false–a reality, an absolute and everlasting truth. Yes, we inevitably turn to God; for this religious sentiment is of its nature so pure, so delightful to the soul that experiences it, that it makes up to us for all our other losses.'" Mustapha Mond shut the book and leaned back in his chair. "One of the numerous things in heaven and earth that these philosophers didn't dream about was this" (he waved his hand), "us, the modern world. 'You can only be independent of God while you've got youth and prosperity; independence won't take you safely to the end.' Well, we've now got youth and prosperity right up to the end. What follows? Evidently, that we can be independent of God. 'The religious sentiment will compensate us for all our losses.' But there aren't any losses for us to compensate; religious sentiment is superfluous. And why should we go hunting for a substitute for youthful desires, when youthful desires never fail? A substitute for distractions, when we go on enjoying all the old fooleries to the very last? What need have we of repose when our minds and bodies continue to delight in activity? of consolation, when we have soma? of something immovable, when there is the social order?
”
”
Aldous Huxley (Brave New World)
“
Oh, all right,” she said balefully, beginning to shake all over. “I’ll admit it—I want you. There, are you satisfied? I want you.”
“In what capacity? Lover, or husband?”
Annabelle stared at him in shock. “What?” His arms slid around her, holding her quivering frame securely against his. He said nothing, only watched her intently as she tried to grasp the implications of the question.
“But you’re not the marrying kind,” she managed to say weakly. He touched her ear, his fingertip tracing the fragile outer curve. “I’ve discovered that I am when it comes to you.” The subtle caress set fire to her blood, making it difficult to think.
“We would probably kill each other within the first month.” “Probably,” Hunt conceded, his smiling mouth brushing over her temple. The warmth of his lips sent a rush of dizzying pleasure through her.
“But marry me anyway, Annabelle. As I see things, it would solve most of your problems …and more than a few of mine.” His big hand slid gently down her spine, calming her tremors.
“Let me spoil you,” he whispered. “Let me take care of you. You’ve never had anyone to lean on, have you? I’ve got strong shoulders, Annabelle.” A deep laugh rumbled in his chest. “And I may possibly be the only man of your acquaintance who’ll be able to afford you.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Secrets of a Summer Night (Wallflowers, #1))
“
There's one way. Only one. Mine." Balthazar stepped closer, using every inch he had on Lucas, who was tall but not that tall. "Charity is a person. The same as you, the same as me."
"You and me aren't the same."
Balthazar cocked his head. "Then let's say the same as Bianca. Will that make you listen?"
"Bianca's no killer! She didn't have a choice about what she is."
"Guys, don't do this," I pleaded, but they paid no attention.
"A choice? You think we all get a choice?" Although Balthazar spoke softly, there was a roughness to his voice I'd never heard before. It sent chills down my spine. "Try being hunted down in the night. Try running as far and as fast as you can and finding out their faster. Try coming to in a stable, with your parents' dead bodies on the ground in front of you, your hands roped above your head and a dozen hungry vampires arguing with each other about who gets you next. See how much choice you have then."
Lucas just stared at him. Obviously he'd never imagined anything like that; neither had I.
Even more quietly, Balthazar continued, "Try watching your baby sister die, and then tell me that you wouldn't spend the rest of eternity trying to make up for it. When you've done all that, Lucas, then you can talk to me about choices. Until that time, tell me what I need to know and then shut your mouth.
”
”
Claudia Gray (Stargazer (Evernight, #2))
“
In the cage is the lion. She paces with her memories. Her body is a record of her past. As she moves back and forth, one may see it all: the lean frame, the muscular legs, the paw enclosing long sharp claws, the astonishing speed of her response. She was born in this garden. She has never in her life stretched those legs. Never darted farther than twenty yards at a time. Only once did she use her claws. Only once did she feel them sink into flesh. And it was her keeper's flesh. Her keeper whom she loves, who feeds her, who would never dream of harming her, who protects her. Who in his mercy forgave her mad attack, saying this was in her nature, to be cruel at a whim, to try to kill what she loves. He had come into her cage as he usually did early in the morning to change her water, always at the same time of day, in the same manner, speaking softly to her, careful to make no sudden movement, keeping his distance, when suddenly she sank down, deep down into herself, the way wild animals do before they spring, and then she had risen on all her strong legs, and swiped him in one long, powerful, graceful movement across the arm. How lucky for her he survived the blow. The keeper and his friends shot her with a gun to make her sleep. Through her half-open lids she knew they made movements around her. They fed her with tubes. They observed her. They wrote comments in notebooks. And finally they rendered a judgment. She was normal. She was a normal wild beast, whose power is dangerous, whose anger can kill, they had said. Be more careful of her, they advised. Allow her less excitement. Perhaps let her exercise more. She understood none of this. She understood only the look of fear in her keeper's eyes. And now she paces. Paces as if she were angry, as if she were on the edge of frenzy. The spectators imagine she is going through the movements of the hunt, or that she is readying her body for survival. But she knows no life outside the garden. She has no notion of anger over what she could have been, or might be. No idea of rebellion.
It is only her body that knows of these things, moving her, daily, hourly, back and forth, back and forth, before the bars of her cage.
”
”
Susan Griffin (Woman and Nature: The Roaring Inside Her)
“
I know why you said you don't see a future for us.' My heart races like it's trying to take flight as I blurt out the words.
'Do you?' Of course he isn't going to make this easy. I'm not sure the man even knows what easy is.
'You want me,' I say, looking him in the eyes. 'And no, I'm not just talking about in bed. You. Want. Me, Xaden Riorson. You might not say it, but you do one better and show it. You show it every time you choose to trust me, every time your eyes linger on mine. You show it with every sparring lesson you don't have time for and every flight lesson that pulls you away from your own studies. You show it when you refuse to touch me because you're worried I don't really want you, then show it again when you take the time to hunt down violets before a leadership meeting so I don't wake up feeling alone. You show it in a million different ways. Please don't deny it.'
His jaw flexes, but he doesn't deny it.
'You think we don't have a future because you're scared that I won't like who you really are behind all those walls you keep. And I@m scared, too. I can admit it. You're graduating. I'm not. You'll be gone in a matter of weeks, and we're probably setting ourselves up for heartbreak. But if we let fear kill whatever this is between us, then we don't deserve it.' I lift one hand to the back of his neck. 'I told you that I was the one who would decide when I'm ready to risk my heart, and I'm saying it.'
The way he looks at me, with the same mix of hope and apprehension currently flooding my system, gives me absolute life.
'You don't mean that,' he says, shaking his head.
And there he goes, sucking the life right out again.
'I mean it.
”
”
Rebecca Yarros (Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1))
“
Sean: …………And I'd ask you about war, you'd probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, "once more unto the breach dear friends." But you've never been near one. You've never held your best friend's head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I'd ask you about love, you'd probably quote me a sonnet. But you've never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn't know what it's like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything, through cancer. And you wouldn't know about sleeping sitting up in the hospital room for two months, holding her hand, because the doctors could see in your eyes, that the terms "visiting hours" don't apply to you. You don't know about real loss, 'cause it only occurs when you've loved something more than you love yourself. And I doubt you've ever dared to love anybody that much. And look at you... I don't see an intelligent, confident man... I see a scared shitless kid. But you're a genius Will. No one denies that. No one could possibly understand the depths of you. But you presume to know everything about me because you saw a painting of mine, and you ripped my life apart. You're an orphan right?
[Will nods]
Sean: You think I know the first thing about how hard your life has been, how you feel, who you are, because I read Oliver Twist? Does that encapsulate you? Personally... I don't give a shit about all that, because you know what, I can't learn anything from you, I can't read in some book. Unless you want to talk about you, who you are. Then I'm fascinated. I'm in. But you don't want to do that do you sport? You're terrified of what you might say. Your move, chief.
”
”
Matt Damon
“
One day, as Sarita tended to the wash, Gemma played in the garden. She was a knight, you see, with a sword fashioned out of wood. Most formidable, she was, though I didn't quite know how formidable. As I sat in my study, I heard screaming from outside. I ran to see what the commotion was. Sarita called to me, wide-eyed with fear, "Oh, Mr. Doyle, look- over there!" The tiger had entered the garden and was making his way toward where our Gemma frolicked with her wooden sword. Beside me, our house servant, Raj, drew his blade so stealthily it seemed to simply appear in his hand by magic. But Sarita stayed his hand. "If you run for him with your life, you will provoke the tiger," she advised. "We must wait."...
I must tell you that it was the longest moment of my life. No one dared move. No one dared draw a breath. And all the while, Gemma played on, taking no notice until the great cat was upon her. She stood and faced him. They stared at one another as if each wondered what to make of the other, as if they sensed a kindred spirit. At last, Gemma placed her sword upon the ground. "Dear tiger," she said. "You may pass if you are peaceful." The tiger looked at the sword and back at Gemma, and without a sound, it passed on, dissappearing into the jungle."
...
"The tiger had gone. He did not come around a gain. But I was a man possessed. The tiger had come too close, you see. I no longer felt safe. I hired the best tracker in Bombay. We hunted for days, tracking the tiger to the mountains there. We found him taking water from a small watering hole. He looked up but he did not charge. He took no notice of us at all but continued to drink. "Sahib, let us go," the boy said. "This tiger means you no harm." He was right, of course. But we had come all that way. The gun was in my hand. The tiger was before us. I took aim and shot it dead on the spot. I sold the tiger's skin for a fortune to a man in Bombay, and he called me brave for it. But it was not courage that brought me to that; it was fear..."But you," he says, smiling with a mix of sadness and pride, "you faced the tiger and survived."
...
"The time has come for me to face my tiger, to look him in the eye and see which of us survives." - Mr. Doyle
”
”
Libba Bray (The Sweet Far Thing (Gemma Doyle, #3))
“
Sometime the witch hunting takes on atrocious dimensions — the Nazi persecution of Jews, the Salem witch trials, the Ku Klux Klan scapegoating of blacks. Notice, however, that in all such cases the persecutor hates the persecuted for precisely those traits that the persecutor displays with a glaringly uncivilized fury. At other times, the witch hunt appears in less terrifying proportions—the cold war fear of a "Commie under every bed," for instance. And often, it appears in comic form—the interminable gossip about everybody else that tells you much more about the gossiper than about the object of gossip. But all of these are instances of individuals desperate to prove that their own shadows belong to other people.
Many men and women will launch into tirades about how disgusting homosexuals are. Despite how decent and rational they otherwise try to behave, they find themselves seized with a loathing of any homosexual, and in an emotional outrage will advocate such things as suspending gay civil rights (or worse). But why does such an individual hate homosexuals so passionately? Oddly, he doesn’t hate the homosexual because he is homosexual; he hates him because he sees in the homosexual what he secretly fears he himself might become. He is most uncomfortable with his own natural, unavoidable, but minor homosexual tendencies, and so projects them. He thus comes to hate the homosexual inclinations in other people—but only because he first hates them in himself.
And so, in one form or another, the witch hunt goes. We hate people "because," we say, they are dirty, stupid, perverted, immoral.... They might be exactly what we say they are. Or they might not. That is totally irrelevent, however, because we hate them only if we ourselves unknowingly possess the despised traits ascribed to them. We hate them because they are a constant reminder of aspects of ourselves that we are loathe to admit.
We are starting to see an important indicator of projection. Those items in the environment (people or things) that strongly affect us instead of just informing us are usually our own projections. Items that bother us, upset us, repulse us, or at the other extreme, attract us, compel us, obsess us—these are usually reflections of the shadow. As an old proverb has it,
I looked, and looked, and this I came to see:
That what I thought was you and you,
Was really me and me.
”
”
Ken Wilber (No Boundary: Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth)
“
Tenways showed his rotten teeth. ‘Fucking make me.’
‘I’ll give it a try.’ A man came strolling out of the dark, just his sharp jaw showing in the shadows of his hood, boots crunching heedless through the corner of the fire and sending a flurry of sparks up around his legs. Very tall, very lean and he looked like he was carved out of wood. He was chewing meat from a chicken bone in one greasy hand and in the other, held loose under the crosspiece, he had the biggest sword Beck had ever seen, shoulder-high maybe from point to pommel, its sheath scuffed as a beggar’s boot but the wire on its hilt glinting with the colours of the fire-pit. He sucked the last shred of meat off his bone with a noisy slurp, and he poked at all the drawn steel with the pommel of his sword, long grip clattering against all those blades. ‘Tell me you lot weren’t working up to a fight without me. You know how much I love killing folk. I shouldn’t, but a man has to stick to what he’s good at. So how’s this for a recipe…’ He worked the bone around between finger and thumb, then flicked it at Tenways so it bounced off his chain mail coat. ‘You go back to fucking sheep and I’ll fill the graves.’
Tenways licked his bloody top lip. ‘My fight ain’t with you, Whirrun.’
And it all came together. Beck had heard songs enough about Whirrun of Bligh, and even hummed a few himself as he fought his way through the logpile. Cracknut Whirrun. How he’d been given the Father of Swords. How he’d killed his five brothers. How he’d hunted the Shimbul Wolf in the endless winter of the utmost North, held a pass against the countless Shanka with only two boys and a woman for company, bested the sorcerer Daroum-ap-Yaught in a battle of wits and bound him to a rock for the eagles. How he’d done all the tasks worthy of a hero in the valleys, and so come south to seek his destiny on the battlefield. Songs to make the blood run hot, and cold too. Might be his was the hardest name in the whole North these days, and standing right there in front of Beck, close enough to lay a hand on. Though that probably weren’t a good idea.
‘Your fight ain’t with me?’ Whirrun glanced about like he was looking for who it might be with. ‘You sure? Fights are twisty little bastards, you draw steel it’s always hard to say where they’ll lead you. You drew on Calder, but when you drew on Calder you drew on Curnden Craw, and when you drew on Craw you drew on me, and Jolly Yon Cumber, and Wonderful there, and Flood – though he’s gone for a wee, I think, and also this lad here whose name I’ve forgotten.’ Sticking his thumb over his shoulder at Beck. ‘You should’ve seen it coming. No excuse for it, a proper War Chief fumbling about in the dark like you’ve nothing in your head but shit. So my fight ain’t with you either, Brodd Tenways, but I’ll still kill you if it’s called for, and add your name to my songs, and I’ll still laugh afterwards. So?’
‘So what?’
‘So shall I draw?
”
”
Joe Abercrombie (The Heroes)
“
You are protected, in short, by your ability to love!" said Dum-bledore loudly. "The only protection that can possibly work against the lure of power like Voldemort's! In spite of all the temptation you have endured, all the suffering, you remain pure of heart, just as pure as you were at the age of eleven, when you stared into a mir-ror that reflected your heart's desire, and it showed you only the way to thwart Lord Voldemort, and not immortality or riches. Harry, have you any idea how few wizards could have seen what you saw in that mirror? Voldemort should have known then what he was dealing with, but he did not! But he knows it now. You have flitted into Lord Voldemort's mind without damage to yourself, but he cannot possess you with-out enduring mortal agony, as he discovered in the Ministry. I do not think he understands why, Harry, but then, he was in such a hurry to mutilate his own soul, he never paused to understand the incomparable power of a soul that is untarnished and whole."
"But, sir," said Harry, making valiant efforts not to sound argu-mentative, "it all comes to the same thing, doesn't it? I've got to try and kill him, or —"
"Got to?" said Dumbledore. "Of course you've got to! But not because of the prophecy! Because you, yourself, will never rest until you've tried! We both know it! Imagine, please, just for a moment,
that you had never heard that prophecy! How would you feel about Voldemort now? Think!"
Harry watched Dumbledore striding up and down in front ol him, and thought. He thought of his mother, his father, and Sinus. He thought of Cedric Diggory. He thought of all the terrible deeds he knew Lord Voldemort had done. A flame seemed to leap inside his chest, searing his throat.
"I'd want him finished," said Harry quietly. "And I'd want to do it."
"Of course you would!" cried Dumbledore. "You see, the prophecy does not mean you have to do anything! But the prophecy caused Lord Voldemort to mark you as his equal. ... In other words, you are free to choose your way, quite free to turn your back on the prophecy! But Voldemort continues to set store by the prophecy. He will continue to hunt you . . . which makes it certain, really, that —"
"That one of us is going to end up killing the other," said Harry. "Yes."
But he understood at last what Dumbledore had been trying to tell him. It was, he thought, the difference between being dragged into the arena to face a battle to the death and walking into the arena with your head held high. Some people, perhaps, would say that there was little to choose between the two ways, but Dumble-dore knew — and so do I, thought Harry, with a rush of fierce pride, and so did my parents — that there was all the difference in the world.
”
”
J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6))
“
The berth belongs to you too. It will always be there when—if you want to come back.”
Inej could not speak. Her heart felt too full, a dry creek bed ill-prepared for such rain. “I don’t know what to say.”
His bare hand flexed on the crow’s head of his cane. The sight was so strange Inej had trouble tearing her eyes from it. “Say you’ll return.”
“I’m not done with Ketterdam.” She hadn’t known she meant it until she said the words.
Kaz cast her a swift glance. “I thought you wanted to hunt slavers.”
“I do. And I want your help.” Inej licked her lips, tasted the ocean on them. Her life had been a series of impossible moments, so why not ask for something impossible now? “It’s not just the slavers. It’s the procurers, the customers, the Barrel bosses, the politicians. It’s everyone who turns a blind eye to suffering when there’s money to be made.”
“I’m a Barrel boss.”
“You would never sell someone, Kaz. You know better than anyone that you’re not just one more boss scraping for the best margin.”
“The bosses, the customers, the politicians,” he mused. “That could be half the people in Ketterdam—and you want to fight them all.”
“Why not?” Inej asked. “One the seas and in the city. One by one.”
“Brick by brick,” he said. Then he gave a single shake of his head, as if shrugging off the notion. “I wasn’t made to be a hero, Wraith. You should have learned that by now. You want me to be a better man, a good man. I—“
“This city doesn’t need a good man. It needs you.”
“Inej—“
“How many times have you told me you’re a monster? So be a monster. Be the thing they all fear when they close their eyes at night. We don’t go after all the gangs. We don’t shut down the houses that treat fairly with their employees. We go after women like Tante Heleen, men like Pekka Rollins.” She paused. “And think about it this way…you’ll be thinning the competition.”
He made a sound that might almost have been a laugh.
One of his hands balanced on his cane. The other rested at his side next to her. She’d need only move the smallest amount and they’d be touching. He was that close. He was that far from reach.
Cautiously, she let her knuckles brush against his, a slight weight, a bird’s feather. He stiffened, but he didn’t pull away.
“I’m not ready to give up on this city, Kaz. I think it’s worth saving.” I think you’re worth saving.
Once they’d stood on the deck of a ship and she’d waited just like this. He had not spoken then and he did not speak now. Inej felt him slipping away, dragged under, caught in an undertow that would take him farther and farther from shore. She understood suffering and knew it was a place she could not follow, not unless she wanted to drown too.
Back on Black Veil, he’d told her they would fight their way out. Knives drawn, pistols blazing. Because that’s what we do. She would fight for him, but she could not heal him. She would not waste her life trying.
She felt his knuckles slide again hers. Then his hand was in her hand, his palm pressed against her own. A tremor moved through him. Slowly, he let their fingers entwine.
”
”
Leigh Bardugo (Crooked Kingdom (Six of Crows, #2))
“
Let me tell you a story,” I say instead. “Once upon a time, there was a girl whose life was saved by the faery king—”
“This story sounds distinctly familiar. I think I might have heard it somewhere before.”
I shush him and say not to interrupt. “If anyone asked her how she felt about the king, she would have said she loathed him. He ruthlessly trained her to fight his own kind. He taught her to kill. She learned from his lessons how to quiet the rage that burned inside her. But she had already decided that one day, when she had grown strong enough and learned everything she could about battle, she was going to murder him.”
Kiaran goes still, his eyes glittering in the darkness. He says nothing.
“Her opportunity came one night when he decided she was ready to hunt her first faery. It was a skriker that had been terrorizing a nearby village, slaughtering children in the night. The king handed the girl his sword and ordered her to kill the goblin-like creature.
“She barely won. But in the end, as she thrust the sword deep into the monster’s gut, she felt something so profoundly that she thought it would consume her. So she told the king. She whispered the words and meant them with every part of her rage-filled soul: ‘I hate you. I hate all of you.’ When she lifted the sword again, she intended to pierce it right through his heart.
“That was the first time the girl had ever seen the faery king smile.”
I lift my hand and press my palm to Kiaran’s cheek. “You’ll have to finish the story. She never knew why he smiled. Just that one day, she wanted to see him do it again. So she dropped the sword and spared his life. And she never told the king what really happened that night.”
Kiaran looks amused. “The king knew the girl’s plan all along. He smiled because he decided he liked her. She kept things interesting.”
I stare at him. “So the faery king is a deranged sort. As the girl always suspected.”
“How about his side of this story?” He pulls me close, his lips soft on my shoulder. “He never told the girl that during a hunt, when she ran alongside him with the wind in her hair and the moonlight behind her, that she was the most magnificent thing he had ever seen and he wanted her.”
Then Kiaran’s hands are in my hair, lips brushing mine. “And when the king watched her in battle, she’d look over at him with a smile and he desired her.
“It was never at once,” he continued. “It was after everything they had gone through and then it was the king and the girl facing an entire army together. And he knew the truth. His heart was hers. It always was. It always will be.”
A shadow crosses Kiaran’s irises. A reminder that he’s still fighting. Just to be here. With me. He shuts his eyes, expression strained. Before I can ask if he’s all right, he pulls me against him and holds me close.
His next words are spoken under his breath, so low I wonder if I heard them at all. “The girl helps the king keep his darkness at bay.
”
”
Elizabeth May (The Fallen Kingdom (The Falconer, #3))