β
The past doesnβt change, does it?β
βItβs still there, same as it ever was. But we see it differently as we get older.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires)
β
One thing that's certain about the future: it will have more history than the present.
β
β
Paul McAuley
β
This is an age of superstition and wishful thinking. The sky is full of evening's empires, and every one of them is founded on sand.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires)
β
One thing Iβve learnt in life is that you only know where things start. You never know where itβs going to end up.
β
β
Vicki McAuley (Solo)
β
The mountain is awake, with utterance
Of flame and burning rock and thunderous sound-
Abode of the ancestral spirits who dance
In blissful fire! Tremors run through the ground
And through men's hearts. The people stand dismayed
By prophecies as mantic ghosts invade
With alien voice the soothsayers in their trance.
β
β
James McAuley
β
What is the mass of a feeling? What is its wavelength, its position on the electromagnetic spectrum?
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires)
β
We live in an age that cannibalises its past because it has lost faith in its future.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires)
β
When people go looking for something, they often find something else.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires)
β
Aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands.
β
β
Brian McAuley (Candy Cain Kills (Killer VHS Series, #2))
β
pareidolia. They heard whispering voices in the radio pulses of Jupiter or Saturn.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires (The Quiet War Book 4))
β
Even the straightest path has two directions.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
He was the one thing in my life that was still my choice. And I chose him above the Revolution.
β
β
S.A. McAuley (One Breath One Bullet (The Borders War, #1))
β
Fuck my country and yours, they will continue fighting whether we live or die. But I can't, and won't, go on without you. Not anymore.
β
β
S.A. McAuley (One Breath One Bullet (The Borders War, #1))
β
But you need to cultivate patience, youngling. And you need to listen to my words of wisdom, because as far as you are concerned, I am Obi-Wan fucking Kenobi. Okay?
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (Jackaroo, #1))
β
Where are we going?β Tony said.
βSomewhere wonderful,β Unlikely Worlds said.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
That is the disease of the new Millennium. Obsession with self-image, obsession with estranging technologies.
β
β
Paul J. McAuley (Fairyland)
β
This lake is alive. Kicking. Breathing. Frothing. I envision it's as angry as I am. As resolved to its fate as I've become. But the only thing this lake has conceded is that to fight is to lose, so it rolls with the brutal slip of seasons. There is no whisper of argument from the waves. They take this beating and crest forward, down, on top of themselves. Over and over again. With a strength I try to breathe in. To believe in.
β
β
S.A. McAuley (This is What a Cold Lake Looks Like)
β
had been insulin shock therapy, in which the patient was injected with insulin to induce a short coma; the theory was that regular treatments, a coma a day, might slowly chip away at the effects of psychosis. Then came the lobotomy, the severing of the nerves of a patientβs frontal lobesβwhich, as the British psychiatrist W. F. McAuley delicately put it, βdeprives the patient of certain qualities with which, and perhaps because of which, he has failed to adapt.
β
β
Robert Kolker (Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family)
β
Denise, the Nazi soldiers in those trucks do not suspect they're about to be outfoxed by two girls." In the stillness before we spring back itno action, Denise looks to me, grinning like mad. She quotes a line from King Kong, one of my favorite movies I watched with Tom.
"'Oh no. It wasn't the airplanes. It was Beauty killed the Beast.
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
The multiverse, she said, was like an old library whose shelves were packed with books arranged by a cataloguing system that ranked them according to similarity, each book containing within its covers a story that varied only slightly from the stories of its immediate neighbours, but by increasing degrees from those of increasingly distant books.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires)
β
Your lingering presence erodes me. Heartbeat by heartbeat. Cell by aging cell. Washing away any sense of self I ever had. Intruding into a nothingness I've struggled to find the pieces to fill. A jar filled with stones, piled with pebbles, topped with sand, only to be left with the knowledge that water, with enough time and persistence, has the power to wash it all away.
Your name is on my lips. Frozen. A familiar cadence of syllables that once soothed me.
A name I can't speak. Can't think of.
Not on this shore, at our lake. Not on this day. When only a year ago, with a foreshadowing that is now ice in my veins, you stood next to me, in this jacket, your hand in mine, so warm, and stared out at this expanse and whispered in awe, "This is what a cold lake looks like.
β
β
S.A. McAuley (This is What a Cold Lake Looks Like)
β
My deepest appreciation to: Everyone at Scholastic Press, especially Marijka Kostiw, Kristina Albertson, Tracy Mack, and Leslie Budnick. Tracey Adams, my wonderful agent. The members of my critique groups, each of whom possess that rare combination of Charlotte the spider: a true friend and a good writer. My retreat-mates who put me on the right track: Franny Billingsley, Toni Buzzeo, Sarah Lamstein, Dana Walrath, Mary Atkinson, Carol Peacock, and Jackie Davies. With special thanks to Amy Butler Greenfield, Nancy Werlin, Amanda Jenkins, Denise Johns, Melissa Wyatt, Lisa Firke, Lisa Harkrader, Laura Weiss, Mary Pearson, Amy McAuley, and Kristina Cliff-Evans. And to my parents, Earl and Elaine Lord, who gave me wings but always left the porch light on to show the way home.
β
β
Cynthia Lord (Rules (Scholastic Gold))
β
Abulanamβs Pride emerged into a sky dominated by the heaven tree of a stellar nursery. Billowing thunderheads and swirling currents of sooty dust, silicate grains and gas aglow with the radiation of hot bright stars embedded in them. Ragged pillars, shaped by light and stellar winds, clawing across a dozen light years, spalling offshoots tipped with the blowsy haloes of stars birthing in collapsing knots of protostellar material. A vast, violent engine of creation.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
Five sisters. That must have been hell."
"Only when they forced me to dress up like a girl and play Amy whenever they reenacted Little Women"
Giggling as quietly as possible, I say, "You had to play Amy? Why didn't they let you be Laurie?"
"My sister Beth insisted on playing Laurie. Figure that one out. One of the March sisters had her very own name, but no sir, she had to be a boy. I had to pretend, dressed as a girl, to marry my own sister dressed as boy." His laugh is good-natured. "I believe the word thats coming to your mind is disturbing.
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
Ugly Chicken says sheβs nice,β the little girl said. Freddie
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (The Choice, #1))
β
She said, βIs that legal?β βI was trained to use bigger guns than this.β Which didnβt exactly answer her question.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (The Choice, #1))
β
The report also said I show great potential as an agent. I figure they must be right, since I successfully broke into a safe to find that out.
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
I'm sure lovely girls such as yourselves need not worry about this"βMadame LaRoche begins, and I have a hunch we're about to be cautioned against something we enjoy
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
A lesson to people who think that, just because theyβre a little smarter and luckier than ordinary people, they can do as they please.β Lisa
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Something Coming Book 2))
β
You should feel right at home here, Denise" Robbie says. Near the top, he sets my suitcase on the floor of the loft and continues to climb. As his foot clears the last step, he adds, "Judging from your manners, I'd guess you were raised in a barn.
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
Tell me every detail. All but the dull parts, I mean.
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
I aim at the middle one first. I squeeze the trigger. And the metal weapon does what it does best. It jams.
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
Are you taking us to hell?" I ask, and Denise answers with an ominous, "More or less.
β
β
Amy McAuley (Violins of Autumn)
β
They were sitting outside the big Starbucks that anchored the western end of Pioneer Square. Lisa was drinking iced tea sweetened with half a dozen packets of sugar, Bria a flat white, Pete sprawled under the table with a dish of water. All around, people sat at cafΓ© tables in the late afternoon sunlight, perched on broad steps that dropped to the well where a gout of water pulsed and plashed. Smart little yellow trams ran along one side of the square, which was bordered by office buildings and the plate-glass windows of high-end shops. A sliver of Earth jammed into this alien world, where a dozen or more Elder Cultures had lived and died out or ascended to some unfathomable stage of consciousness, leaving behind ruins and artefacts, scraps of technology, algorithms and eidolons. A perfectly ordinary sceneβ¦
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
Sometimes you hit the jackpot and sometimes the jackpot hits you, I guess.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
How to tell a story? First find a point of view.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
They celebrated in a bar, and after half a dozen cocktails came to the mutual decision that it would be a blast to get married. So Lisa bought a couple of rings in a pawnshop and they did the deed in the hotel chapel, reading their vows in Klingon off an iPhone in front of a guy in golden robes and Spock ears.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
There were hundreds of worlds like it, most of them littered with the usual Elder Culture ruins, the usual secrets waiting to be unlocked. This one had been colonised by an atechnic cult sixty years ago. Maybe they were living the life of pastoral utopianism theyβd planned; maybe they had descended into savagery and were roasting and eating prisoners of war captured in tribal wars fought with stone-tipped spears. No one knew nor cared.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
There are many stories,β Unlikely Worlds said, βbut most follow similar patterns.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
Nothing recedes into the vanishing point of timeβs rear-view faster than the truth.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Austral)
β
There was a small commercial area a little further on, clustered around a crossroads where a huge latticework globe stood on a plinth of black baserock. Maps, some entire and others patchworked from islands or continents, none bigger than a childβs hand, were scattered thinly across its surface. The home map, Gea, was a squarish red tile close to the equator, smaller than most of the rest, and a silvery ball representing the Heartsun was spindled at the centre, and everything was spattered by the droppings of a fractious parliament of vivid green birds which had colonised the globeβs pole, chattering each to each and scolding passers-by.
β
β
Paul McAuley (War of the Maps)
β
I didnβt know this kind of shit was about to happen,β Katrina hisses. βThis fucker has suckered us in and sold us out. For the second time.β Katrina lapses into this kind of tough guy dialogue when sheβs stressed β she learned English from virtual shoot-βem-ups. Firelight flatters her face. She looks young and fierce and alert, a warrior-princess from the sagas in a black leather jacket, buckled biker boots and black leggings. All she lacks are mirrorshades.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Fairyland)
β
There was no way Trevor could even try to deny his evasiveness at this point. It wasnβt as if he was running from the fact that he ran or that Deacon was being secretive about having secrets. They both were hiding parts of their lives from each other. He could only laugh darkly at the absurdity of it all. βYou think?
β
β
S.A. McAuley (Damaged Package)
β
The next Monday, assembly seemed to go on forever. The kindy kids got up to sing βKookaburraβ, and then half of year two were awarded certificates for reading. Holly thought it would never end. Then
β
β
Rowan McAuley (Class Captain (Go Girl!))
β
Ching Ching. βThereβs only bread left for us.β βAre
β
β
Rowan McAuley (Go Girl! #1 Sleep-over!)
β
Thatβs where we are,β he said. βOne star amongst four hundred billion.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
Keeping the human race in check must require a lot of multitasking.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
Armise and I had met through the scope of our rifles and sometimes I wondered if that was also where we'd end.
β
β
S.A. McAuley (One Breath One Bullet (The Borders War, #1))
β
I couldn't fight the urge to close my eyes, to match my breathing to his. And I was flooded with a feeling that couldn't be serenity. Because Peacemakers were never meant to know real peace.
β
β
S.A. McAuley (One Breath One Bullet (The Borders War, #1))
β
Your so-called βselfβ is a composite superimposed on the activity of many competing subpersonalities or agents. What you perceive as your consciousness is a string of temporary heroes rising above those they have defeated. And so you seek out heroes in the common story of your race.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through)
β
The concept of hero is very interesting to us,β Unlikely Worlds said. βWe are composites. No one component is worth more than any other. Your minds are in some ways similar. Your so-called βselfβ is a composite superimposed on the activity of many competing subpersonalities or agents. What you perceive as your consciousness is a string of temporary heroes rising above those they have defeated. And so you seek out heroes
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through)
β
to escape the deepening grip of multinational corporations and the Coca-colonisation of the weird. Out here, you could still have your mind eaten by an alien phantom, stumble upon a lost city, or discover a fraying thread of some kind of weird quantumised metamaterial that could kick-start a new industrial revolution and make you a billionaire. Out here were places not yet mapped. Old dreams and deep mysteries. A world wild and strange and still mostly unknown.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through)
β
Drink up. I get more enjoyable the higher your blood alcohol content gets.
β
β
S.A. McAuley (Damaged Package)
β
Everythingβs a data point.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (Jackaroo, #1))
β
I fear that there will be no neat ending to this, in the manner of the old Greek plays. Where the Gods descend, and all is explained, and tidied away.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (Jackaroo, #1))
β
One day something will come through that will amaze us all.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (Jackaroo, #1))
β
A poster by the door to the locker room showed a Jackaroo avatar dressed as Uncle Sam, pointing a white-gloved finger under the caption I Want You for Anal Probing.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (Jackaroo, #1))
β
Listen: Iβm not going to tell you what to do. We cannot make decisions for you. We came to help, but we do not want to interfere. We gave you a gift, yours to do with as you will. But youβve heard all that before. Weβre happy to talk. To answer questions about why we donβt stop war and suffering, cure cancer, end poverty, point the way to heaven or point out that there is no heaven. Ask us anything. We donβt mind. We try our best to be candid, but there is an inevitable degree of mutual incomprehension. Because your qualia arenβt our qualia. Because weβre running models of who you think you are and what you think you know, but theyβre just models. Because the map isnβt the territory. Because we arenβt gods. We arenβt even close. You know? At best, weβre pipers at the gates of dawn. Who have come to this little blue planet to help.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Something Coming Through (Jackaroo, #1))
β
Pyotr said that all children were Godβs children, even those whose minds had been overwritten by alien memes.
βWhat about the Jackaroo and the !Cha?β Tony said.
βThose also.β
βAnd the Elder Cultures?β
βOf course. The universe and everything in it is Her Kingdom.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
The things you people can do now!β Unlikely Worlds said. βThe stories you make!
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
The tug of the lodestar slowly grew stronger until, with an abrupt quantum jump, it was a physical force prying at her mind. She felt everything else fall away, felt the same out-of-body swoon sheβd experienced on First Foot when sheβd stared too long at the star at the edge of the Badlands. Felt as if she was expanding beyond her body the room the ship into everywhere β¦
β
β
Paul McAuley (Into Everywhere (Jackaroo, #2))
β
Pick up the world and turn it over, as Mama liked to say, and you wonβt find fair written anywhere on it.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Austral)
β
Turns out that capitalism is unkillable because it kills every other system first.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Austral)
β
Hari was still young enough to believe that the world was sensitive to his emotions and moods, that everyone was a player in the drama of his life.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires (The Quiet War Book 4))
β
We fight to establish fundamental truths. The proxies fight over whether or not meat from a particular species of animal should be eaten, or on which day it should be eaten, or how it should be prepared. But I admit that I do rather admire them. They could certainly teach you a thing or two about revenge.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires (The Quiet War Book 4))
β
I was taught that the existence of the Universe does not require a first cause. And that its creation and everything in it can be explained by observation and deduction.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires (The Quiet War Book 4))
β
They were the last remnant of the old Western cults which had venerated the primacy of the individual. The ghosts of libertarians trying to keep their little candle-flames of ego-self alight for as long as possible, refusing to understand that flames are never the same but are always dancing, always changing.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Evening's Empires (The Quiet War Book 4))
β
A significant proportion of the work of the Reclamation and Reconstruction Corps had been concerned with replacement of topsoil lost by erosion caused by overfarming, or poisoned by industry during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, or stripped away by floods and hyperstorms during the Overturn.
β
β
Paul McAuley (The Quiet War)
β
Nostalgia for a simplified and deeply nativist version of history, a past that had never existed except in the mythologies of people, mostly male, mostly white, mostly straight, who found the modern world too complicated.
β
β
Paul McAuley (Austral)
β
Her nameβs Aurora McAuley; among many other things, sheβs President of the Society for Creative Anachronisms. And if you thought Draco was impressive, wait until you see some of their otherβahβcreations.
β
β
Arthur C. Clarke (3001: The Final Odyssey (Space Odyssey #4))
β
Once upon a time, women were the equals of men. Not only by law, although that was important, and the result of many hard-fought and difficult battles. But also by culture and by custom. Men came to accept that women should have the same rights of self-determination that they enjoyed. But then there was the Overturn, and the great crisis caused by sudden and catastrophic climate change.
β
β
Paul McAuley (In the Mouth of the Whale (The Quiet War Book 3))
β
Absolute scientific truth was like the speed of light, a value which could be approached but never reached.
β
β
Paul McAuley (In the Mouth of the Whale)