Prey Book Quotes

For once the disease of reading has laid upon the system it weakens so that it falls an easy prey to that other scourge which dwells in the ink pot and festers in the quill. The wretch takes to writing.

It is a pity that there are no big creatures to prey on humanity. If there were enough dragons and rocs, perhaps mankind would turn its might against them. Unfortunately man is preyed upon by microbes, which are too small to be appreciated.

Guys are prey that you hunt, capture, and slaughter. If you don’t have this mindset, you will become the prey… I’ve been the prey once, and I’ll be damned if I let it happen again

A great book increases my heartbeat as if I’m prey, melts my insides in anticipation of a first kiss, immerses me in its depths.

A fine gentleman like that, they said, had no need of books. Let him leave books, they said, to the palsied or the dying. But worse was to come. For once the disease of reading has laid hold upon the system it weakens it so that it falls an easy prey to that other scourge which dwells in the ink pot and festers in the quill. The wretch takes to writing.

What is literature but the expression of moods by the vehicle of symbol and incident? And are there not moods which need heaven, hell, purgatory, and faeryland for their expression, no less than this dilapidated earth? Nay, are there not moods which shall find no expression unless there be men who dare to mix heaven, hell, purgatory, and faeryland together, or even to set the heads of beasts to the bodies of men, or to thrust the souls of men into the heart of rocks? Let us go forth, the tellers of tales, and seize whatever prey the heart long for, and have no fear. Everything exists, everything is true, and the earth is only a little dust under our feet." (A Teller of Tales)

Long Time. The famous seventeenth-century Ming painter Chou Yung relates a story that altered his behavior forever. Late one winter afternoon he set out to visit a town that lay across the river from his own town. He was bringing some important books and papers with him and had commissioned a young boy to help him carry them. As the ferry neared the other side of the river, Chou Yung asked the boatman if they would have time to get to the town before its gates closed, since it was a mile away and night was approaching. The boatman glanced at the boy, and at the bundle of loosely tied papers and books—“Yes,” he replied, “if you do not walk too fast.” As they started out, however, the sun was setting. Afraid of being locked out of the town at night, prey to local bandits, Chou and the boy walked faster and faster, finally breaking into a run. Suddenly the string around the papers broke and the documents scattered on the ground. It took them many minutes to put the packet together again, and by the time they had reached the city gates, it was too late. When you force the pace out of fear and impatience, you create a nest of problems that require fixing, and you end up taking much longer than if you had taken your time.

I swayed between fear, defiance, and nausea, and was wholly the prey of my passion. I could not and did not want to listen to the depths. But on the seventh night, the spirit of the depths spoke to me: “Look into your depths, pray to your depths, waken the dead.

This is a forum for readers. Authors walk these halls at their own risk. I’ve been to the Coliseum in Rome. GR is just that. Books are gladiators. Readers are ravenous citizens awaiting their next bite of entertainment, all Caesars with thumbs readied for judgement. Even champions fall prey to sword now and then. And you know what they say about the pen and the sword…the analogy is a bit muddled, but it’s in there somewhere.

What about you? What do you do?” I needed to ask questions, draw him out. I needed to find out all the information I could. My voice sounded strong and smooth, but my hands were shaking. I put them in my lap so he couldn’t see. “I prey on innocent villagers and terrify their children,” he said with a nasty smile. “And sometimes when I’m feeling really evil, I read books or paint.

Any chick who carried around a bird of prey with a little helmet was cool in my book. Oh, man, I really hoped she didn’t intend to kill us all.

Spiders don't chew. They send a special liquid into their prey. The prey's insides turn to mush. Then the spider sucks up its tasty lunch!

Predator and prey move in silent gestures, on the seductive dance of death, in the shadows cast by the vultures of the night. ☥

The problem with a lot of people who read only literary fiction is that they assume fantasy is just books about orcs and goblins and dragons and wizards and bullshit. And to be fair, a lot of fantasy is about that stuff. The problem with people in fantasy is they believe that literary fiction is just stories about a guy drinking tea and staring out the window at the rain while he thinks about his mother. And the truth is a lot of literary fiction is just that. Like, kind of pointless, angsty, emo, masturbatory bullshit. However, we should not be judged by our lowest common denominators. And also you should not fall prey to the fallacious thinking that literary fiction is literary and all other genres are genre. Literary fiction is a genre, and I will fight to the death anyone who denies this very self-evident truth. So, is there a lot of fantasy that is raw shit out there? Absolutely, absolutely, it’s popcorn reading at best. But you can’t deny that a lot of lit fic is also shit. 85% of everything in the world is shit. We judge by the best. And there is some truly excellent fantasy out there. For example, Midsummer Night’s Dream; Hamlet with the ghost; Macbeth, ghosts and witches; I’m also fond of the Odyessey; Most of the Pentateuch in the Old Testament, Gargantua and Pantagruel. Honestly, fantasy existed before lit fic, and if you deny those roots you’re pruning yourself so closely that you can’t help but wither and die.

Barristan Semly was not a bookish man, but he had often glanced through the pages of the White Book, where the deeds of his predecessors had been recorded. Some had been heroes, some weaklings, knaves, or cravens. Most were only men - quicker and stronger than most, more skilled with sword and shield, but still prey to pride, ambition, lust, love, anger, jealousy, greed for gold, hunger for power, and all the other failing that afflicted lesser mortals. The best of them overcame their flaws, did their duty, and died with their swords in their hands. The worst ... The worst were those who played the game of thrones.

Captain Harvile: Poor Phoebe, she would not have forgotten him so soon. It was not in her nature. Anne Elliot: It would not be in the nature of any woman who truly loved. Captain Harvile: Do you claim that for your sex? Anne Elliot: We do not forget you as soon as you forget us. We cannot help ourselves. We live at home, quiet, confined, and our feelings prey upon us. You always have business of some sort or other to take you back into the world. Captain Harvile: I won't allow it to be any more man's nature than women's to be inconstant or to forget those they love or have loved. I believe the reverse. I believe... Let me just observe that all histories are against you, all stories, prose, and verse. I do not think I ever opened a book in my life which did not have something to say on women's fickleness. Anne Elliot: But they were all written by men.

I prey on innocent villagers and terrify their children," he said with a nasty smile. "And sometimes when I'm feeling really evil, I read books or paint.

Our Voice is our most powerful tool against these evil people who prey on the innocent, we should never be silent and let them continue to harm people. By being silent we are telling them it is “Okay to continue”. I firmly believe if you choose to stand with those who wish to keep the victim silent you are yourself guilty of a crime against humanity - Misty Griffin

It was clear to her now, Happiness was a seductive illusion. No one as fucked up as her deserved one drop of joy. But oh god was it delicious when it fell into her lap for a little while. (Such a pretty face) she muses (with such a bruised and battered soul). When the dawn of a promise fades into the dusk of reality, all that remains is the nightmare. Sweet, sweet loneliness. Shadows come to play and prey on her beaten mind. Her lovely little dreams of poison.

Knowing almost nothing about books or serious magazines, intellectually he is a creature of the movie house, where he is an easy prey to fantasies concocted by Hollywood for the gullible. He

Ah, a puny apprentice. Easy prey for Yellowfang,

Such are contrasts we see every day in the world. Joy and Sorrow! But Joy is an exile from Heaven who does not remain in any one place. Sorrow is a son of Hell who does not release his prey until he has torn it to pieces.

I wondered what kind of monsters lurked in theaters to prey on people sitting by themselves because their brothers wouldn't get out of bed to take them to the movies.

How can you stand to do it? The poor little mouse!" Grover shrugged. "It's nature," he said. "Nature likes the snake just as much as the mouse.

Tahn crept up the stone wall like a reptile silent after its prey.

Book dragons. I’d somehow fallen prey to a pair of book dragons.

there is nothing more enticing to a predator than wounded prey.

nations never see themselves clearly in the mirror, much less when war preys on their minds

It goes without saying that even those of us who are going to hell will get eternal life—if that territory really exists outside religious books and the minds of believers, that is. Having said that, given the choice, instead of being grilled until hell freezes over, the average sane human being would, needless to say, rather spend forever idling in an extremely fertile garden, next to a lamb or a chicken or a parrot, which they do not secretly want to eat, and a lion or a tiger or a crocodile, which does not secretly want to eat them.

We do know, however that almost no animal routinely kills prey animal on an indiscriminate basis. The only wild animal I’ve seen who will sometimes violate this rule is the coyote. Most of the time a coyote eats the animals he kills, but occasionally coyotes will go on a lamb-killing spree, killing twenty and eating only one. I believe it’s possible coyotes have lost some of their economy of behavior by living in close proximity to humans and overabundant food supplies. A coyote that kills twenty lambs and eats only one isn’t going to have to trek a hundred miles to find more lambs next week. Any sheep rancher will have several hundred other lambs that will be just as easy to catch later on, and the coyote knows it. Wild coyotes have probably lost the knowledge that you shouldn't waste food or energy.

The true danger of romanticism is that the principles through which it rules itself are of such nature that everybody can invoke them to grant themselves the category of artist. Taking the anxiety of an unreachable happiness, the angst of unrealized dreams, the indifference towards action and life, as the defining criteria of genius or talent, immediately facilitates everyone who feels or has felt that same anxiety, suffers that same angst and is prey of that particular indifference, to feel themselves convinced that they themselves are an interesting individuality, and that Destiny, granting them that longing, suffering and dreams, implicitly bestowed on them intellectual greatness.

Our history deserves honesty and our citizens need it. Without understanding who we really were, we’ll never quite grasp who we have become, leaving us prey to demagogues and despicable entertainments.

When writers who are just starting out ask me when it gets easier, my answer is never. It never gets easier. I don’t want to scare them, so I rarely say more than that, but the truth is that, if anything, it gets harder. The writing life isn’t just filled with predictable uncertainties but with the awareness that we are always starting over again. That everything we ever write will be flawed. We may have written one book, or many, but all we know — if we know anything at all — is how to write the book we’re writing. All novels are failures. Perfection itself would be a failure. All we can hope is that we will fail better. That we won’t succumb to fear of the unknown. That we will not fall prey to the easy enchantments of repeating what may have worked in the past. I try to remember that the job — as well as the plight, and the unexpected joy — of the artist is to embrace uncertainty, to be sharpened and honed by it. To be birthed by it. Each time we come to the end of a piece of work, we have failed as we have leapt—spectacularly, brazenly — into the unknown.

My mother used to tell me, every time we were watching Cinderella, that Cinderella had the best attitude and that I should strive to be just like her. Later when I grew up, I resented my mother for teaching me that way, as I saw it as the reason why I often felt preyed on by people who were much more like the ugly stepsisters. But now, all of a sudden, I’ve realized that what my mom meant was that no matter how ugly people can be to you, no matter how rough they treat you, no matter how much their actions tempt you to become your worst— you should overcome them by never letting them steal your gentleness. People only win when they are able to take away your gentleness, your sweetness. But if you remember that you’re a princess, and they’re just not, at the end of the day you win! Still, my mom should have pointed me in the direction of Belle from Beauty and the Beast. Cinderella is fine, but had she taught me that Belle was the best way to be, I would have probably never grown to resent that. Belle always retained her gentleness but she could still beat up a pack of wolves at the same time and that’s the kind of princess I wanted to be like! Not to mention she loved books!

The day you’re born you are given a name, a Nationality, religion to follow, God to prey, an evil to fear, and a big rule book that you have to abide by to live among them for they have brought you in without your permission as a welcome kit.

When reading the history of the Jewish people, of their flight from slavery to death, of their exchange of tyrants, I must confess that my sympathies are all aroused in their behalf. They were cheated, deceived and abused. Their god was quick-tempered unreasonable, cruel, revengeful and dishonest. He was always promising but never performed. He wasted time in ceremony and childish detail, and in the exaggeration of what he had done. It is impossible for me to conceive of a character more utterly detestable than that of the Hebrew god. He had solemnly promised the Jews that he would take them from Egypt to a land flowing with milk and honey. He had led them to believe that in a little while their troubles would be over, and that they would soon in the land of Canaan, surrounded by their wives and little ones, forget the stripes and tears of Egypt. After promising the poor wanderers again and again that he would lead them in safety to the promised land of joy and plenty, this God, forgetting every promise, said to the wretches in his power:—'Your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness and your children shall wander until your carcasses be wasted.' This curse was the conclusion of the whole matter. Into this dust of death and night faded all the promises of God. Into this rottenness of wandering despair fell all the dreams of liberty and home. Millions of corpses were left to rot in the desert, and each one certified to the dishonesty of Jehovah. I cannot believe these things. They are so cruel and heartless, that my blood is chilled and my sense of justice shocked. A book that is equally abhorrent to my head and heart, cannot be accepted as a revelation from God. When we think of the poor Jews, destroyed, murdered, bitten by serpents, visited by plagues, decimated by famine, butchered by each, other, swallowed by the earth, frightened, cursed, starved, deceived, robbed and outraged, how thankful we should be that we are not the chosen people of God. No wonder that they longed for the slavery of Egypt, and remembered with sorrow the unhappy day when they exchanged masters. Compared with Jehovah, Pharaoh was a benefactor, and the tyranny of Egypt was freedom to those who suffered the liberty of God. While reading the Pentateuch, I am filled with indignation, pity and horror. Nothing can be sadder than the history of the starved and frightened wretches who wandered over the desolate crags and sands of wilderness and desert, the prey of famine, sword, and plague. Ignorant and superstitious to the last degree, governed by falsehood, plundered by hypocrisy, they were the sport of priests, and the food of fear. God was their greatest enemy, and death their only friend. It is impossible to conceive of a more thoroughly despicable, hateful, and arrogant being, than the Jewish god. He is without a redeeming feature. In the mythology of the world he has no parallel. He, only, is never touched by agony and tears. He delights only in blood and pain. Human affections are naught to him. He cares neither for love nor music, beauty nor joy. A false friend, an unjust judge, a braggart, hypocrite, and tyrant, sincere in hatred, jealous, vain, and revengeful, false in promise, honest in curse, suspicious, ignorant, and changeable, infamous and hideous:—such is the God of the Pentateuch.

If there's such a thing as love at first sight, then I certainly did not fall prey to its mystical power the moment my eyes met his. I only felt a poke of wonder, as if seeing a book with a unique title. Nothing instant and extreme feeling I felt. My heart was in one piece.

But Clara’s father believed that nations never see themselves clearly in the mirror, much less when war preys on their minds. He had a good understanding of history and knew that the future could be read much more clearly in the streets, factories, and barracks than in the morning press.

Religion as we know it, Spinoza argues in the work’s preface, is nothing more than organized superstition. Power-hungry ecclesiastics prey on the naïveté of citizens, taking advantage of their hopes and fears in the face of the vicissitudes of nature and the unpredictability of fortune to gain control over their beliefs and their daily lives. The preface of the Treatise both makes clear Spinoza’s contempt for sectarian religions and opens the way for his reductive and naturalistic explanations of central doctrinal and historical elements of the Judeo-Christian traditions.

Stalked He stalks her waiting for the right time, a single purpose stirring within his mind. His soul longs for that one deep connation, as his body seeks its final redemption. For he is the hunter and she his prey, her power untouched waiting for the moment to be set free on that final day. One sweet tasted form his lips as death he willed her way.

The heroic and often tragic stories of American whalemen were renowned. They sailed the world’s oceans and brought back tales filled with bravery, perseverance, endurance, and survival. They mutinied, murdered, rioted, deserted, drank, sang, spun yarns, scrimshawed, and recorded their musings and observations in journals and letters. They survived boredom, backbreaking work, tempestuous seas, floggings, pirates, putrid food, and unimaginable cold. Enemies preyed on them in times of war, and competitors envied them in times of peace. Many whalemen died from violent encounters with whales and from terrible miscalculations about the unforgiving nature of nature itself. And through it all, whalemen, those “iron men in wooden boats” created a legacy of dramatic, poignant, and at times horrific stories that can still stir our emotions and animate the most primal part of our imaginations. “To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme,” proclaimed Herman Melville, and the epic story of whaling is one of the mightiest themes in American history.

...throughout history the community of readers has been prey to sinister forces - to pedants and priests, legislators and lunatics, deities and demagogues. You have paid for your passion in humiliation, mutilation, and sometimes even - as when Henry VIII burned Bible translator William Tyndale as a heretic - immolation. I salute you all, as do my fellow books.

BEATRICE: Do you truly not know who he was? Mr. Dorian Gray, the lover of Mr. Oscar Wilde, who was sent to Reading Gaol for—well, for holding opinions that society does not approve of! For believing in beauty, and art, and love. What guilt and remorse he must feel, for causing the downfall of the greatest playwright of the age! It was Mr. Gray’s dissolute parties, the antics of his hedonistic friends, that exposed Mr. Wilde to scandal and opprobrium. No wonder he has fallen prey to the narcotic. MARY: Or he could just like opium. He didn’t seem particularly remorseful, Bea. JUSTINE: Mr. Gray is not what society deems him to be. He has been greatly misunderstood. He assures me that he had no intention of harming Mr. Wilde. MARY: He would say that. CATHERINE: Can we not discuss the Wilde scandal in the middle of my book? You’re going to get it banned in Boston, and such other puritanical places.

I wonder,' Trull said as he watched the momentary stand-off, 'if this is how domestication first began. Not banding together in a hunt for prey, but in an elimination of rival predators.

Somehow she would manage to introduce herself, and before her victim had scented danger she had proffered an invitation to her suite. Her method of attack was so downright and sudden that there was seldom opportunity to escape. At the Côte d’Azur she staked a claim upon a certain sofa in the lounge, midway between the reception hall and the passage to the restaurant, and she would have her coffee there after luncheon and dinner, and all who came and went must pass her by. Sometimes she would employ me as a bait to draw her prey, and, hating my errand, I would be sent across the lounge with a verbal message, the loan of a book or paper, the address of some shop or other, the sudden discovery of a mutual friend. It seemed as though notables must be fed to her,

The animal does not rebel against its own kind. Consider animals: how just they are, how well-behaved, how they keep to the time-honored, how loyal they are to the land that bears them, how they hold to their accustomed routes, how they care for their young, how they go together to pasture, and how they draw one another to the spring. There is not one that conceals its overabundance of prey and lets its brother starve as a result. There is not one that tries to enforce its will on those of its own kind. Not a one mistakenly imagines that it is an elephant when it is a mosquito. The animal lives fittingly and true to the life of its species, neither exceeding nor falling short of it. He who never lives his animal must treat his brother like an animal. Abase yourself and live your animal so that you will be able to treat your brother correctly. You will thus redeem all those roaming dead who strive to feed on the living. And do not turn anything you do into a law, since that is the hubris of power.

A serving-man, proud in heart and mind; that curled my hair; wore gloves in my cap; served the lust of my mistress' heart, and did the act of darkness with her; swore as many oaths as I spake words, and broke them in the sweet face of heaven: one that slept in the contriving of lust, and waked to do it: wine loved I deeply, dice dearly: and in woman out-paramoured the Turk: false of heart, light of ear, bloody of hand; hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in prey. Let not the creaking of shoes nor the rustling of silks betray thy poor heart to woman: keep thy foot out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy pen from lenders' books, and defy the foul fiend. Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind: Says suum, mun, ha, no, nonny. Dolphin my boy, my boy, sessa! let him trot by. Storm still.

This girl is beyond forbidden. She is mafia royalty, a princess in her own right. She has lived and breathed a world that I have only watched and preyed upon from the shadows. She is a lamb being abducted by the wolf.

Caroline, or Sister Carrie, as she had been half affectionately termed by the family, was possessed of a mind rudimentary in its power of observation and analysis. Self-interest with her was high, but not strong. It was, nevertheless, her guiding characteristic. Warm with the fancies of youth, pretty with the insipid prettiness of the formative period, possessed of a figure promising eventual shapeliness and an eye alight with certain native intelligence, she was a fair example of the middle American class—two generations removed from the emigrant. Books were beyond her interest—knowledge a sealed book. In the intuitive graces she was still crude. She could scarcely toss her head gracefully. Her hands were almost ineffectual. The feet, though small, were set flatly. And yet she was interested in her charms, quick to understand the keener pleasures of life, ambitious to gain in material things. A half-equipped little knight she was, venturing to reconnoitre the mysterious city and dreaming wild dreams of some vague, far-off supremacy, which should make it prey and subject—the proper penitent, grovelling at a woman's slipper.

Moray eels have a second set of jaws deep at the back of their throat which shoot forward at high speed, grab the prey and rapidly protract backwards again, pulling the prey down into the oesophagus as the animal closes its mouth.

I believe in brevity. I believe that you, the reader, entrust me, the writer, with your most valued commodity—your time. I shouldn’t take more than my share. For that reason, I love the short sentence. Big-time game it is. Hiding in the jungle of circular construction and six-syllable canyons. As I write, I hunt. And when I find, I shoot. Then I drag the treasure out of the trees and marvel. Not all of my prey make their way into chapters. So what becomes of them? I save them. But I can’t keep them to myself. So, may I invite you to see my trophy case? What follows are cuts from this book and a couple of others. Keep the ones you like. Forgive the ones you don’t. Share them when you can. But if you do, keep it brief. Pray all the time. If necessary, use words. Sacrilege is to feel guilt for sins forgiven. God forgets the past. Imitate him. Greed I’ve often regretted. Generosity—never. Never miss a chance to read a child a story. Pursue forgiveness, not innocence. Be doubly kind to the people who bring your food or park your car. In buying a gift for your wife, practicality can be more expensive than extravagance. Don’t ask God to do what you want. Ask God to do what is right. Nails didn’t hold God to a cross. Love did.

Of all the passers-through, the species that means most to me, even more than geese and cranes, is the upland plover, the drab plump grassland bird that used to remind my gentle hunting uncle of the way things once had been, as it still reminds me. It flies from the far Northern prairies to the pampas of Argentina and then back again in spring, a miracle of navigation and a tremendous journey for six or eight ounces of flesh and feathers and entrails and hollow bones, fueled with bug meat. I see them sometimes in our pastures, standing still or dashing after prey in the grass, but mainly I know their presence through the mournful yet eager quavering whistles they cast down from the night sky in passing, and it makes me think of what the whistling must have been like when the American plains were virgin and their plover came through in millions. To grow up among tradition-minded people leads one often into backward yearnings and regrets, unprofitable feelings of which I was granted my share in youth-not having been born in time to get killed fighting Yankees, for one, or not having ridden up the cattle trails. But the only such regret that has strongly endured is not to have known the land when when it was whole and sprawling and rich and fresh, and the plover that whet one's edge every spring and every fall. In recent decades it has become customary- and right, I guess, and easy enough with hindsight- to damn the ancestral frame of mind that ravaged the world so fully and so soon. What I myself seem to damn mainly, though, is just not having seen it. Without any virtuous hindsight, I would likely have helped in the ravaging as did even most of those who loved it best. But God, to have viewed it entire, the soul and guts of what we had and gone forever now, except in books and such poignant remnants as small swift birds that journey to and from the distant Argentine and call at night in the sky.

But it will make a difference to you if you don’t believe you are beautiful and someone tells you that. Then you are going to say, “Am I really?” This opinion can impress you, and, of course, that makes you easy prey. This opinion is what you think you need, because you believe you are not beautiful.

You could always tell when a storm was coming, because the street vendors would start selling their overpriced umbrellas and shout at pedestrians to buy them. It was an aggressive tactic, preying on a customer’s immediate need for shelter. If that wasn’t a metaphor for the human condition, then I didn’t know what was.

In book 8 of Plato’s Republic, Socrates argues that people are not naturally led to self-governance but rather seek a strong leader to follow. Democracy, by permitting freedom of speech, opens the door for a demagogue to exploit the people’s need for a strongman; the strongman will use this freedom to prey on the people’s resentments and fears. Once the strongman seizes power, he will end democracy, replacing it with tyranny. In short, book 8 of The Republic argues that democracy is a self-undermining system whose very ideals lead to its own demise. Fascists have always been well acquainted with this recipe for using democracy’s liberties against itself; Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels once declared, “This will always remain one of the best jokes of democracy, that it gave its deadly enemies the means by which it was destroyed.” Today is no different from the past. Again, we find the enemies of liberal democracy employing this strategy, pushing the freedom of speech to its limits and ultimately using it to subvert others’ speech.

Every journalist who is not too stupid or too full of himself to notice what is going on knows that what he does is morally indefensible. He is a kind of confidence man, preying on people's vanity, ignorance or loneliness, gaining their trust and betraying them without remorse. Like the credulous widow who wakes up one day to find the charming young man and all her savings gone, so the consenting subject of a piece of nonfiction learns—when the article or book appears—his hard lesson. Journalists justify their treachery in various ways according to their temperaments. The more pompous talk about freedom of speech and "the public's right to know"; the least talented talk about Art; the seemliest murmur about earning a living.

The men were clearly feeling very confident. Logically, they did have a reason to be cocky—it was a five against one fight. But the main flaw in their logic was they didn’t know their opponent. Downing the shutters means you can take your time doling out punishment as all escape routes have been closed off. But that works both ways. There are times when the hunters become the prey.

They hunted our prey, destroyed our homes, and killed our culture to make us serve them. When we objected, they twisted us, forcing us to stand taller, bleed more red, and even speak their words. Soon, we replaced their machines, and the humans were finally happy with their easy lives. In only a few generations, we became their greatest tool, kept in check by our primal needs and shackled by our own minds. Our

Methinks, Oh! vain ill-judging Book, I see thee cast a wishful look, Where reputations won and lost are In famous row called Paternoster. Incensed to find your precious olio Buried in unexplored port-folio, You scorn the prudent lock and key, And pant well bound and gilt to see Your Volume in the window set Of Stockdale, Hookham, or Debrett. Go then, and pass that dangerous bourn Whence never Book can back return: And when you find, condemned, despised, Neglected, blamed, and criticised, Abuse from All who read you fall, (If haply you be read at all Sorely will you your folly sigh at, And wish for me, and home, and quiet. Assuming now a conjuror’s office, I Thus on your future Fortune prophesy: — Soon as your novelty is o’er, And you are young and new no more, In some dark dirty corner thrown, Mouldy with damps, with cobwebs strown, Your leaves shall be the Book-worm’s prey; Or sent to Chandler–Shop away, And doomed to suffer public scandal, Shall line the trunk, or wrap the candle! But should you meet with approbation, And some one find an inclination To ask, by natural transition Respecting me and my condition; That I am one, the enquirer teach, Nor very poor, nor very rich; Of passions strong, of hasty nature, Of graceless form and dwarfish stature; By few approved, and few approving; Extreme in hating and in loving; Abhorring all whom I dislike, Adoring who my fancy strike; In forming judgements never long, And for the most part judging wrong; In friendship firm, but still believing Others are treacherous and deceiving, And thinking in the present aera That Friendship is a pure chimaera: More passionate no creature living, Proud, obstinate, and unforgiving, But yet for those who kindness show, Ready through fire and smoke to go. Again, should it be asked your page, ‘Pray, what may be the author’s age?’ Your faults, no doubt, will make it clear, I scarce have seen my twentieth year, Which passed, kind Reader, on my word, While England’s Throne held George the Third. Now then your venturous course pursue: Go, my delight! Dear Book, adieu!

Like Plato, Kant believed that human beings have a dual nature: part animal and part rational. The animal part of us follows the laws of nature, just as does a falling rock or a lion killing its prey. There is no morality in nature; there is only causality. But the rational part of us, Kant said, can follow a different kind of law: It can respect rules of conduct, and so people (but not lions) can be judged morally for the degree to which they respect the right rules. What might those rules be? Here Kant devised the cleverest trick in all moral philosophy. He reasoned that for moral rules to be laws, they had to be universally applicable. If gravity worked differently for men and women, or for Italians and Egyptians, we could not speak of it as a law. But rather than searching for rules to which all people would in fact agree (a difficult task, likely to produce only a few bland generalities), Kant turned the problem around and said that people should think about whether the rules guiding their own actions could reasonably be proposed as universal laws. If you are planning to break a promise that has become inconvenient, can you really propose a universal rule that states people ought to break promises that have become inconvenient? Endorsing such a rule would render all promises meaningless. Nor could you consistently will that people cheat, lie, steal, or in any other way deprive other people of their rights or their property, for such evils would surely come back to visit you. This simple test, which Kant called the “categorical imperative,” was extraordinarily powerful. It offered to make ethics a branch of applied logic, thereby giving it the sort of certainty that secular ethics, without recourse to a sacred book, had always found elusive.

Evolved organs, elegant and efficient as they often are, also demonstrate revealing flaws – exactly as you’d expect if they have an evolutionary history, and exactly as you would not expect if they were designed. I have discussed examples in other books: the recurrent laryngeal nerve, for one, which betrays its evolutionary history in a massive and wasteful detour on its way to its destination. Many of our human ailments, from lower back pain to hernias, prolapsed uteruses and our susceptibility to sinus infections, result directly from the fact that we now walk upright with a body that was shaped over hundreds of millions of years to walk on all fours. Our consciousness is also raised by the cruelty and wastefulness of natural selection. Predators seem beautifully ‘designed’ to catch prey animals, while the prey animals seem equally beautifully ‘designed’ to escape them. Whose side is God on?

Hartwell’s subconscious was treated to a lengthy reel of the evolutionary tract of cetaceans – from their early days as hoofed creatures with triangular teeth like wolves, to cat-like creatures, to early variations of the hippopotamus, to bottlenose dolphins and Orca, the ‘killer whale’, which is the largest species of dolphin. The hybrid mammal also had the ability to convert to a smaller aquatic mammal, capable of diving into water and hiding beneath the surface to avoid birds of prey.

there were two Patrick Batemans: there was the handsome and socially awkward boy next door whose name no one could remember because he seemed like everybody else—having conformed like everybody else—and there was the nocturnal Bateman who roamed the streets looking for prey, asserting his monstrousness, his individuality. At the end of the ’80s I saw this as an appropriate response to a society obsessed with the surface of things and inclined to ignore anything that even hinted at the darkness lurking below. The novel seemed an accurate summation of the Reagan era, with the Iran-Contra affair being obliquely referenced in the last chapter, and the violence unleashed inside was connected to my frustration, and at least hinted at something real and tangible in this superficial age of surfaces. Because blood and viscera were real, death was real, rape and murder were real—though in the world of American Psycho maybe they weren’t any more real than the fakery of the society being depicted. That was the book’s bleak thesis.

The taste for books was an early one. As a child he was sometimes found at midnight by a page still reading. They took his taper away, and he bred glow-worms to serve his purpose. They took the glow-worms away, and he almost burnt the house down with a tinder. To put it in a nutshell, leaving the novelist to smooth out the crumpled silk and all its implications, he was a nobleman afflicted with a love of literature. Many people of his time, still more of his rank, escaped the infection and were thus free to run or ride or make love at their own sweet will. But some were early infected by a germ said to be bred of the pollen of the asphodel and to be blown out of Greece and Italy, which was of so deadly a nature that it would shake the hand as it was raised to strike, and cloud the eye as it sought its prey, and make the tongue stammer as it declared its love. It was the fatal nature of this disease to substitute a phantom for reality, so that Orlando, to whom fortune had given every gift--plate, linen, houses, men-servants, carpets, beds in profusion--had only to open a book for the whole vast accumulation to turn to mist. The nine acres of stone which were his house vanished; one hundred and fifty indoor servants disappeared; his eighty riding horses became invisible; it would take too long to count the carpets, sofas, trappings, china, plate, cruets, chafing dishes and other movables often of beaten gold, which evaporated like so much sea mist under the miasma. So it was, and Orlando would sit by himself, reading, a naked man.

All morning I struggled with the sensation of stray wisps of one world seeping through the cracks of another. Do you know the feeling when you start reading a new book before the membrane of the last one has had time to close behind you? You leave the previous book with ideas and themes—characters even—caught in the fibers of your clothes, and when you open the new book, they are still with you. Well, it was like that. All day I had been prey to distractions. Thoughts, memories, feelings, irrelevant fragments of my own life, playing havoc with my concentration.

I wanted to thank you,” Grith explained. “You are the first human I have ever truly seen as a dragon-like creature. One that is like us, rather than like prey. It is difficult for me to dislike one that I see only as a food source, and my personal distaste for you has made me realize that you have progressed beyond that.” She pulled her lips back, long white fangs glinting in the moonlight. “I do not kill other dragons, but if for some reason, I was forced to kill you, nothing would remain of your body but ash. Not a single drop of blood or piece of flesh would be left.

It is easy for a small intellect that knows only a single philosophical presentation, only one secret oral instruction, or only one system of practice, to fall prey to the idea that that is the only correct way. Being open to various traditions can free the mind from bias and partiality, bestowing the insight that perceives the interconnectedness of the various teachings and traditions, their scope, and their particular qualities: this benefit alone outweighs the danger of becoming confused when confronted by different and sometimes apparently divergent Buddhist teachings and traditions.

There is danger that someday the farm land will be gone, the Downtown will be deserted, and the middle class living outside the city boundaries. If it is done intentionally, then that is our choice, but if it is allowed simply to happen without purpose, then that is ignorance. Indianapolis contains fantastic elements to become a vital city, but frequently our heritage has been destroyed in favor of cheap development and easy profits. Architects are not perfect, and many chances to improve our city have been lost. They allow the client to build structures without concern for what that building will do to the surrounding environment. The matter of conscience falls prey to the matter of making a living. A desire to improve our quality of life on the part of the client and profession will provide the best solution for all. Readers of this book, be inquisitive, explore your city, question its growth, let your feelings be known if your city is faulty, speak out if it is praiseworthy. Talk to your architects, politicians and developers; they are professionals, but they are also your servants. Use them to make your city better. Enjoy Indianapolis. It is a city to be lived in and can be taken to heart if one tries.

The sin of Book I is at first sight more obscure, but it is particularly significant. We have seen that there appear to be two very important episodes showing the Red-Crosse a prey to Despair. When we find, further, that of the three Paynim Brethren, Sansfoy, Sansloi and Sansjoy, it is the last who is the Red-Crosse's most formidable enemy, we are driven to assume that there is some special significance in this stressing of a tendency to melancholy. Such a tendency is not now regarded as a serious sin, but in mediaeval times melancholy leading to inertia and in extreme cases to suicide was under the name of accidie one of the recognized Deadly Sins. By Elizabeth's day the much less pregnant term Sloth had been substituted in the usual catalogue, and Spenser nowhere uses the word accidie. But the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries were much preoccupied with the subject. They regarded the sufferers from it as at once in a highly dangerous spiritual state and as intensely interesting. It was the favourite pose of fashionable young men. Hamlet is the supreme treatment of it in literature, but most of the dramatists of the day are interested in it. I suggest that the first Book of the original Faerie Queene treated of the sin of accidie.

A fine gentleman like that, they said, had no need of books. Let him leave books, they said, to the palsied or the dying. But worse was to come. For once the disease of reading has laid upon the system it weakens it so that it falls an easy prey to that other scourge which dwells in the inkpot and festers in the quill. The wretch takes to writing. And while this is bad enough in a poor man, whose only property is a chair and a table set beneath a leaky roof--for he has not much to lose, after all--the plight of a rich man, who has houses and cattle, maidservants, asses and linen, and yet writes books, is pitiable in the extreme.

How I thank God, then, that from the start He has given me a loving wife to be my best friend of all. She is (as the poem at the end of the book suggests) my monastery. For having set out in the Christian life to become a monk, I found myself instead falling in love with a woman. At first I worried intensely that I’d made a huge mistake, fallen prey to a terrible temptation. But what a surprise it was to discover, over the years, that as a married man (and a father too) I have become more and more a true monk than I ever could have been within the walls of a monastery. How is this? It’s because love, true love, sets people free to be whoever they are.

An old, mad, blind, despised, and dying king, - Princes, the dregs of their dull race, who flow Through public scorn, - mud from a muddy spring, - Rulers who neither see, nor feel, nor know, But leech-like to their fainting country cling, Till they drop, blind in blood, without a blow, - A people starved and stabbed in the untilled field, - An army, which liberticide and prey Makes as a two-edged sword to all who would wield, - Golden and sanguine laws which tempt and slay; Religion Christless, Godless - A book sealed; A Senate, - Time's worst statue unrepealed, - Are graves, from which a glorious Phantom may Burst, to illumine our tempestuous day. - Sonnet: England in 1819

Key Takeaways We don’t communicate nearly as much information as we think we do. When you say, “He knows what I meant” or “I made myself clear,” chances are, he doesn’t and you didn’t. Our faces are not nearly as expressive as we think they are; mild boredom can look an awful lot like mild interest or mild concern. We fall prey to two assumptions: (1) that other people see us objectively as we are and (2) that other people see us as we see ourselves. In fact, our perceivers don’t even agree with each other on what they see in us. There are two main reasons we’re so hard to understand: First, no one is actually an open book. And second, our actions are always subject to interpretation.

To help me learn how to practice lectio divina, I’ve enlisted two expert sources. Eugene Peterson opens his book on spiritual reading with an analogy of us reading Scripture like a dog might gnaw a bone. His dog is joyful to have the bone; for a time he plays with it and enjoys having others interact with it. Then he settles in to chew it in a more private area, turning it over for a long time, then burying it only to retrieve it again later and pick up where he left off. Peterson says that in Hebrew, the word we tamely translate as “meditate” on the Scriptures actually means “growl,” like an animal growls over its prey. God wants us to growl in triumph over the Bible before settling in to wrestle with it and worry it like a bone. It’s a marvelous image.

She heard nothing but experienced a sensation that prickled along her spine like a warm touch caressing her skin. Slowly, with the care of prey beneath a predator's survey, she turned her head- and met the gaze of the elegant gentleman lounging at the door. In her travels, she had seen many a striking and charming man, but none had been as handsome as this- and all had been more charming. This man was a statue in stark black and white, hewn from rugged granite and adolescent dreams. His face wasn't really handsome; his nose was thin and crooked, his eyes heavy lidded, his cheekbones broad, stark and hollowed. But he wielded a quality of power, of toughness, that made Eleanor want to huddle into a shivering, cowardly little ball. Then he smiled, and she caught her breath in awe. His mouth... his glorious, sensual mouth. His lips were wide, too wide, and broad, too broad. His teeth were white, clean, strong as a wolf's. He looked like a man seldom amused by life, but he was amused by her, and she realized in a rush of mortification that she remained standing on the stool, reading one of his books and lost to the grave realities of her situation. The reality that stated she was an imposter, sent to mollify this man until the real duchess could arrive. Mollify? Him? Not likely. Nothing would mollify him. Nothing except... well, whatever it was he wanted. And she wasn't fool enough to think she knew what that was. The immediate reality was that she would somehow have to step down onto the floor and of necessity expose her ankles to his gaze. It wasn't as if he wouldn't look. He was looking now, observing her figure with an appreciation all the more impressive for its subtlety. His gaze flicked along her spine, along her backside, and down her legs with such concentration that she formed the impression he knew very well what she looked like clad only in her chemise- and that was an unnerving sensation.

Why does he call you spider?" "It’s a little out of date, actually. When I first met Engels — when I first fell in with that whole crowd, in fact — I would sit with a book in my lap, or something else that I wasn’t really paying attention to, so that I could pretend to be doing something else while I listened to the arguments. One evening someone said something particularly indefensible. And I’d got so comfortable that I objected out loud.” James was smiling, too, his head a little to one side as if he were watching the past as I described it. “In the awful silence that followed — no, don’t laugh, it really was awful at the time — Engels said, “I believe our spider has finished her web. Think before you speak, my friends. Fools are her lawful prey.” “Sitting in corners, observing everything, catching everything, and never letting it get away.” James shook his head, still smiling. “You must be the only woman on the face of the earth who understands that that’s a compliment.

Before the troops left Rome, the consul Varro made a number of extremely arrogant speeches. The nobles, he complained, were directly responsible for the war on Italian soil, and it would continue to prey upon the country's vitals if there were any more commanders on the Fabian model. He himself, on the contrary, would bring it to an end on the day he first caught sight of the enemy. His colleague Paullus spoke only once before the army marched, and in words which though true were hardly popular. His only harsh criticism of Varro was to express his surprise about how any army commander, while still at Rome, in his civilian clothes, could possibly know what his task on the field of battle would be, before he had become acquainted either with his own troops or the enemy's or had any idea of the lie and nature of the country where he was to operate--or how he could prophesy exactly when a pitched battle would occur. As for himself, he refused to recommend any sort of policy prematurely; for policy was moulded by circumstance, not circumstance by policy. . . . [T]o strengthen [Paullus'] determination Fabius (we are told) spoke to him at his departure in the following words. 'If, Lucius Aemilius, you were like your colleague, or if--which I should much prefer--you had a colleague like yourself, anything I could now say would be superfluous. Two good consuls would serve the country well in virtue of their own sense of honour, without any words from me; and two bad consuls would not accept my advice, nor even listen to me. But as things are, I know your colleague's qualities and I know your own, so it is to you alone I address myself, understanding as I do that all your courage and patriotism will be in vain, if our country must limp on one sound leg and one lame one. With the two of you equal in command, bad counsels will be backed by the same legal authority as good ones; for you are wrong, Paullus, if you think to find less opposition from Varro than from Hannibal. Hannibal is your enemy, Varro your rival, but I hardly know which will prove the more hostile to your designs; with the former you will be contending only on the field of battle, but with the latter everywhere and always. . . . [I]t is not the enemy who will make it difficult and dangerous for you to tread, but your fellow-countrymen. Your own men will want precisely what the enemy wants; the wishes of Varro, the Roman consul, will play straight into the hands of Hannibal, commander-in-chief of the Carthaginian armies. You will have two generals against you; but you will stand firm against both, if you can steel yourself to ignore the tongues of men who will defame you--if you remain unmoved by the empty glory your colleague seeks and the false infamy he tries to bring upon yourself. . . . Never mind if they call your caution timidity, your wisdom sloth, your generalship weakness; it is better that a wise enemy should fear you than that foolish friends should praise. Hannibal will despise a reckless antagonist, but he will fear a cautious one. Not that I wish you to do nothing--all I want is that your actions should be guided by a reasoned policy, all risks avoided; that the conduct of the war should be controlled by you at all times; that you should neither lay aside your sword nor relax your vigilance but seize the opportunity that offers, while never giving the enemy a chance to take you at a disadvantage. Go slowly, and all will be clear and sure. Haste is always improvident and blind.

There are many things that men and women ought to think about, and must think about, in private, that they would not for a moment discuss in public. There are books on the proper conduct of women in certain most sacred relations of life, relations of life which are as holy as any, and which can be entered into in the presence of a holy God with no question of His approval, but which do not permit of public mention. . . . That the Bible is a pure book is evidenced by the fact that it is not a favourite book in dens of infamy. But on the other hand, books that try to make out that the Bible is an obscene book, and that endeavour to keep people from reading it, are favourite books in dens of infamy. The unclean classes, both men and women, were devoted admirers of the most brilliant man this country ever produced who attacked what he called the "obscenity of the Bible." These unclean classes do not frequent Bible classes. They do frequent infidel lectures. These infidel objectors to the book as an "obscene book" constantly betray their insincerity and hypocrisy. Colonel Ingersoll . . . objected to the Bible for telling these vile deeds "without a touch of humour." In other words, he did not object to telling stories of vice, if only a joke was made of the sin. Thank God, that is exactly what the Bible does not do--make a joke of sin. It makes sin hideous, so men who are obscene in their own hearts object to the Bible as being an obscene book. . . . To sum up, there are in the Bible descriptions of sins that cannot wisely be read in every public assembly, but these descriptions of sin are morally most wholesome in the places where God, the Author of the Book, manifestly intends them to be read. The child who is brought up to read the Bible as a whole, from Genesis to Revelation, will come to know in the very best way possible what a child ought to know very early in life if he is to be safeguarded against the perils that surround our modern life on every hand. A child who is brought up upon a constant, thorough, continuous reading of the whole Bible is more likely than any other child to be free from the vices that are undermining the mental, moral, and physical strength of our boys and girls, and young men and young women. But the child who is brought up on infidel literature and conversation is the easiest prey there is for the seducer and procuress. The next easiest is the one who, through neglect of the Bible, is left in ignorance of the awful pitfalls of life.

Weakness Our strength will continue if we allow ourselves the courage to feel scared, weak, and vulnerable. —MELODY BEATTIE This is a prayer for the ages. In fact, it helps to define weakness, in spiritual terms, as any habit of mind or heart that prevents us from seeing things exactly as they are, or in their entirety, or with our entire capacity to feel. These are the blindnesses that continually keep us from Truth, Oneness, and Compassion. We are all frail. We all make mistakes. We all fall prey to a thousand emotions and exaggerations. But these things make us rich, not weak—if we are willing to face them squarely. In truth, it is not the tissue of our humanity that defeats us, but rather our refusal to accept who we are and to live accordingly, limitations included. Underneath it all, this blindness, in its many recurring forms, is the cause of most cruelty. For it is during those moments when we think we see so clearly that we break things that are irreplaceable, not even realizing they were precious. After breaking many things in my life—hearts, heirlooms, robins' eggs—I am humbled to admit that the only difference I see on Earth between being strong or weak is the honesty with which we face ourselves, accept ourselves, and share ourselves, blemishes and all.

The translucent, golden punch tastes velvety, voluptuous and not off-puttingly milky. Under its influence, I stage a party for my heroines in my imagination, and in my flat. It's less like the glowering encounter I imagined between Cathy Earnshaw and Flora Poste, and more like the riotous bash in Breakfast at Tiffany's. Not everyone is going to like milk punch. So there are also dirty martinis, and bagels and baklava, and my mother's masafan, Iraqi marzipan. The Little Mermaid is in the bath, with her tail still on, singing because she never did give up her soaring voice. Anne Shirley and Jo March are having a furious argument about plot versus character, gesticulating with ink-stained hands. Scarlett is in the living room, her skirts taking up half the space, trying to show Lizzy how to bat her eyelashes. Lizzy is laughing her head off ut Scarlett has acquired a sense of humour, and doesn't mind a bit. Melanie is talking book with Esther Greenwood, who has brought her baby and also the proofs of her first poetry collection. Franny and Zooey have rolled back the rug and are doing a soft shoe shuffle in rhinestone hats. Lucy Honeychurch is hammering out some Beethoven (in this scenario I have a piano. A ground piano. Well, why not?) Marjorie Morningstar is gossiping about directors with Pauline and Posy Fossil. They've come straight from the shows they're in, till in stage make-up and full of stories. Petrova, in a leather aviator jacket, goggles pushed back, a chic scarf knotted around her neck, is telling the thrilling story of her latest flight and how she fixed an engine fault in mid-air. Mira, in her paint-stained jeans and poncho, is listening, fascinated, asking a thousand questions. Mildred has been persuaded to drink a tiny glass of sherry, then another tiny glass, then another and now she and Lolly are doing a wild, strange dance in the hallway, stamping their feet, their hair flying wild and electric. Lolly's cakes, in the shape of patriarchs she hates, are going down a treat. The Dolls from the Valley are telling Flora some truly scandalous and unrepeatable stories, and she is firmly advising them to get rid of their men and find worthier paramours. Celie is modelling trousers of her own design and taking orders from the Lace women; Judy is giving her a ten-point plan on how to expand her business to an international market. She is quite drunk but nevertheless the plan seems quite coherent, even if it is punctuated by her bellowing 'More leopard print, more leopard print!' Cathy looks tumultuous and on the edge of violent weeping and just as I think she's going to storm out or trash my flat, Jane arrives, late, with an unexpected guest. Cathy turns in anticipation: is it Heathcliff? Once I would have joined her but now I'm glad it isn't him. It's a better surprise. It's Emily's hawk. Hero or Nero. Jane's found him at last, and has him on her arm, perched on her glove; small for a bird of prey, he is dashing and patrician looking, brown and white, observing the room with dark, flinty eyes. When Cathy sees him, she looks at Jane and smiles. And in the kitchen is a heroine I probably should have had when I was four and sitting on my parents' carpet, wishing it would fly. In the kitchen is Scheherazade.

Putting the Other Person Down The manipulator has other options available to help them reach their ultimate goal. One tactic that can be quite effective consists in putting their target down on a regular basis. However, this isn’t done through insults or threats. This covert technique is very useful because the manipulator uses it in a very subtle manner. This can be seen in the abundant use of sarcasm or perhaps passive-aggressive attacks. For example, the manipulator may say, “don’t we look lovely today” when it is clear that the victim is not at their best. A passive-aggressive approach might be something like, “I’m just going to have to take you in for a good scrubbing and a haircut.” It might say in a playful tone, but the subtext is far more sinister. As for the target, they may not realize that they are the subject of manipulation. They may feel terrible as a result of the interaction, but may not realize that they are being deliberately acted upon by the manipulator. Consequently, the target is left to wonder is what the motives might be for being treated in such a manner. Honestly, it doesn’t really matter, at least not to the manipulator. What does matter is that the target is left feeling vulnerable and exposed. This is where the manipulator can make the most of their efforts. When a victim is left feeling defenseless, the manipulator is in a prime position to take advantage ([27]). On the contrary, if a person feels safe and empowered, the likelihood of them being manipulated is quite low. That’s why manipulators prey upon people with low self-esteem. If a person has high self-esteem, then they won’t be easily manipulated. If anything, put-downs and insults will spark a defensive reaction. That would leave the manipulator with no choice but to move on to the next victim.

We’ve all heard the phrase, “When seconds count the police are only minutes away.”  This is not a knock against the police.  Many officers are good friends of mine, and no police force can be everywhere—nor, in a free country, would we want them to be.  But calling the police almost never helps. Criminals, like predators in nature, do not attack when conditions favor the prey, when the sheepdog is alert beside the sheep.  Predators attack when the prey is vulnerable and unprotected.  In other words, when the cops can’t respond fast enough.  When an attack comes you probably won’t be standing in front of the police station.  You’ll be alone, or multi-tasking a busy life, or burdened (tactically speaking) with small children.  You could even be sound asleep.  Your attacker will choose that moment precisely because he thinks he can get away with it.  The mere thought of this is frightening.  And that’s a good thing.  Properly applied, a little bit of fear keeps us alert.  It is OK for children to live without fear.  Indeed, that is a top priority of every parent.  Adults, though, must see the world for what it is, both very good and very bad, and prepare for the worst so they can safely enjoy the best.     This book is about winning the legal battle, and leaves tactical training to others.  In no way does this imply, though, that your first priority shouldn’t be survival.  If you are in a fight for your life, for the life of your spouse or your children or your parents, you MUST win.  Period.  If you don’t win the physical fight, everything else becomes rather less pressing. The good news is that because we know how evil people target their prey we can use this knowledge against them.  Avoid looking weak and the bad guy will seek easier prey.  Stay alert and aware of your surroundings.  Project confidence.  Avoid places where you can get cornered, and make yourself look like more work than you’re worth.   Criminals are sometimes too stupid to know better, but that’s the exception.  They largely know the difference between easy and difficult victims. There’s more than enough easy prey for them.  If you look difficult they’ll move on.

Father will bury us with both hands. He boasts of me to his so-called friends, telling them I’m the next queen of this kingdom. I don’t think he’s ever paid so much attention to me before, and even now, it is minuscule, not for my own benefit. He pretends to love me now because of another, because of Tibe. Only when someone else sees worth in me does he condescend to do the same. Because of her father, she dreamed of a Queenstrial she did not win, of being cast aside and returned to the old estate. Once there, she was made to sleep in the family tomb, beside the still, bare body of her uncle. When the corpse twitched, hands reaching for her throat, she would wake, drenched in sweat, unable to sleep for the rest of the night. Julian and Sara think me weak, fragile, a porcelain doll who will shatter if touched, she wrote. Worst of all, I’m beginning to believe them. Am I really so frail? So useless? Surely I can be of some help somehow, if Julian would only ask? Are Jessamine’s lessons the best I can do? What am I becoming in this place? I doubt I even remember how to replace a lightbulb. I am not someone I recognize. Is this what growing up means? Because of Julian, she dreamed of being in a beautiful room. But every door was locked, every window shut, with nothing and no one to keep her company. Not even books. Nothing to upset her. And always, the room would become a birdcage with gilded bars. It would shrink and shrink until it cut her skin, waking her up. I am not the monster the gossips think me to be. I’ve done nothing, manipulated no one. I haven’t even attempted to use my ability in months, since Julian has no more time to teach me. But they don’t believe that. I see how they look at me, even the whispers of House Merandus. Even Elara. I have not heard her in my head since the banquet, when her sneers drove me to Tibe. Perhaps that taught her better than to meddle. Or maybe she is afraid of looking into my eyes and hearing my voice, as if I’m some kind of match for her razored whispers. I am not, of course. I am hopelessly undefended against people like her. Perhaps I should thank whoever started the rumor. It keeps predators like her from making me prey. Because of Elara, she dreamed of ice-blue eyes following her every move, watching as she donned a crown. People bowed under her gaze and sneered when she turned away, plotting against their newly made queen. They feared her and hated her in equal measure, each one a wolf waiting for her to be revealed as a lamb. She sang in the dream, a wordless song that did nothing but double their bloodlust. Sometimes they killed her, sometimes they ignored her, sometimes they put her in a cell. All three wrenched her from sleep. Today Tibe said he loves me, that he wants to marry me. I do not believe him. Why would he want such a thing? I am no one of consequence. No great beauty or intellect, no strength or power to aid his reign. I bring nothing to him but worry and weight. He needs someone strong at his side, a person who laughs at the gossips and overcomes her own doubts. Tibe is as weak as I am, a lonely boy without a path of his own. I will only make things worse. I will only bring him pain. How can I do that? Because of Tibe, she dreamed of leaving court for good. Like Julian wanted to do, to keep Sara from staying behind. The locations varied with the changing nights. She ran to Delphie or Harbor Bay or Piedmont or even the Lakelands, each one painted in shades of black and gray. Shadow cities to swallow her up and hide her from the prince and the crown he offered. But they frightened her too. And they were always empty, even of ghosts. In these dreams, she ended up alone. From these dreams, she woke quietly, in the morning, with dried tears and an aching heart.

This universal conflict is to be seen most clearly in the animal kingdom. Animals have the vegetable kingdom for their nourishment, and within the animal kingdom again every animal is the prey and food of some other. This means that the matter in which an animal’s Idea manifests itself must stand aside for the manifestation of another Idea, since every animal can maintain its own existence only by the incessant elimination of another’s. Thus the will-to-live generally feasts on itself, and is in different forms its own nourishment, till finally the human race, because it subdues all the others, regards nature as manufactured for its own use. Yet, as will be seen in the fourth book, this same human race reveals in itself with terrible clearness that conflict, that variance of the will with itself, and we get homo homini lupus.71 However, we shall again recognize the same contest, the same subjugation, just as well at the low grades of the will’s objectivity. Many insects (especially the ichneumon flies) lay their eggs on the skin, and even in the body, of the larvae of other insects, whose slow destruction is the first task of the newly hatched brood. The young hydra, growing out of the old one as a branch, and later separating itself therefrom, fights while it is still firmly attached to the old one for the prey that offers itself, so that the one tears it out of the mouth of the other. But the most glaring example of this kind is afforded by the bulldog-ant of Australia, for when it is cut in two, a battle begins between the head and the tail. The head attacks the tail with its teeth, and the tail defends itself bravely by stinging the head. The contest usually lasts for half an hour, until they die or are dragged away by other ants. This takes place every time.

I am looking for a man.” Sonya’s mouth quirked. “Can’t say I recommend that.

You look like you’ve been to the bad part of town,” Anna said with forced cheerfulness. “And that is?” Xixi asked. “These days? All of it’s the bad part,” Eric said.

You’re my friends. It’s our job to make each other strong. That’s what we do. We build each other up while the world is trying to tear us down.

She wasn’t a monster. Okay, she was a monster. But she was trying to not be such a dick.

Trust you! You tried to kill me. More than once.” Gertie threw up her hands in frustration. “Vam-pi-re. I can’t help it if I’m inherently evil.

It’s just like a soap opera! You love her. She doesn’t love you. I hope she slaps you across the face!

you keep talking when I have continually given you facial expressions that clearly show you I would very much like you to stop doing that.

You say funny things sometimes.” “I hope I’m funny all the time. If you don’t got a sense of humor, what do you got?

If there is one thing I love more than romance, it’s definitely violence!

You don’t need to live in isolation, and I want you to know you’re a part of something bigger than you or me. I know this sounds cliché as fuck, but we’re in this together.

Vampires don’t get happy endings.

It’s time to stop being a little bitch.

At least she could gaze at her body and how hot she looked when the flames swallowed her whole.

But, is that not life in general? Sometimes we are presented with opportunities that we did not prepare for, and we must learn not only to adapt but also to make the most of the circumstances given to us.

we do not know how long we will traverse this earth. We must treat every day like it might be our last.

Now, he only hoped everything he’d done, and continued to do, would be enough.

Once he tossed his leather jacket on he’d look like the epitomic bad boy, her favorite kind of boy. Apparently, also her favorite kind of vampire.

Marry me,” Eric said. Xixi tapped his chest, pushing him away dismissively. “Oh, no. No, thank you.

Nice! Just like in the movies. She’s telling us her whole plan.

There are literally no vampire movies I can think of where someone says a magic word or something before turning into a bat or whatever.

He’d be hot if she didn’t hate his fucking guts.

These days, her shoulders felt constantly stiff, as if she’d been carrying the weight of the world on them for two years.

I’m sorry,” Christina said in a real “fuck you” sort of way.

Gertie eyed Sonya’s sword. She steadied herself, trying not to get all hot and bothered watching Sonya prepare to wield the thing.

The lealest lover time can show, Doomed for a lady-love to languish, Among these solitudes doth go, A prey to every kind of anguish. Why Love should like a spiteful foe Thus use him, he hath no idea, But hogsheads full — this doth he know — Don Quixote’s tears are on the flow, And all for distant Dulcinea Del Toboso.

Narcissist’s are well-versed in taking your kindness and your love and using it to their advantage. The entire charade of hurting you, only to subsequently get you back (because they can) is something of an addictive game to them. Like a cat playing with its prey until it decides to put it out of its misery, they don’t stop until they’re bored or satisfied. Remember, even the tiniest rise from you will give them the satisfaction they so desperately search for, so don’t feed their addiction with your attention.

I am a puny part of the great whole. Yes; but all animals condemned to live, All sentient things, born by the same stern law, Suffer like me, and like me also die. The vulture fastens on his timid prey, And stabs with bloody beak the quivering limbs: All’s well, it seems, for it. But in a while An eagle tears the vulture into shreds; The eagle is transfixed by shafts of man; The man, prone in the dust of battlefields, Mingling his blood with dying fellow men, Becomes in turn the food of ravenous birds. Thus the whole world in every member groans, All born for torment and for mutual death. And o’er this ghastly chaos you would say The ills of each make up the good of all! What blessedness! And as, with quaking voice, Mortal and pitiful ye cry, “All’s well,” The universe belies you, and your heart Refutes a hundred times your mind’s conceit. . . . What is the verdict of the vastest mind? Silence: the book of fate is closed to us. Man is a stranger to his own research; He knows not whence he comes, nor whither goes. Tormented atoms in a bed of mud, Devoured by death, a mockery of fate; But thinking atoms, whose far-seeing eyes, Guided by thoughts, have measured the faint stars. Our being mingles with the infinite; Ourselves we never see, or come to know. This world, this theatre of pride and wrong, Swarms with sick fools who talk of happiness. . . . Once did I sing, in less lugubrious tone, The sunny ways of pleasure’s general rule; The times have changed, and, taught by growing age, And sharing of the frailty of mankind, Seeking a light amid the deepening gloom, I can but suffer, and will not repine.50

theory as to where these creatures come from - I think humanity influences the world more than we realize.  I wouldn’t say we create these things, but I do think they adapt to us.  A supernatural evolution, if you will.  Just as a predator adapts to better hunt its prey, so these creatures adapt to our shifting beliefs and values.  And sometimes, just as evolution will spit out something novel, so too will our collective subconscious produce a new entity.

Since the characterizations herein are my own I should clarify these details absent a second’s further delay. Beginning at its newest beginning, with the matters of today – midday, in fact – with a scene punctuated by the appearance and subsequent felinious capture of the vermin given mention. More benignly put, these particular footsteps were taken by a timid, terrified, adolescent Norway rat who would shortly be christened Twitch. I shall focus forthwith upon those details which emerged moments later – subsequent to his short-lived escape from imminent annihilation by scurrying anew. This time beneath an oaken china cabinet. In an effort to avoid confiding any facts or details absent direct pertinence to the life-or-death matter at hand, I’ll reveal for the moment only that its precedent had been a similarly random appearance of a rather less fortunate rat 29 years ere and whose ill-fated tale remains snugly entangled within the roots of this one. Its tangible form began as a spontaneous act of nature that was observed by a 15-year-old dreamer and provoked a flight of fancy which led him to conceive of a grandiose idea that gestated until the man he would become tediously nurtured his evolving purpose into six centuries of historically faithful fables of human survival and struggle ‒ of growth and decay. To put it more tangibly yet ‒ he re-imagined the act of a hungry cat pursuing a frantic rat in the lower Manhattan alleyway in back of his childhood apartment, into an elaborate daydream of a cougar hunting a deer roughly a half-millennia ago. Then ‒ being a born writer ‒ he kicked back in his usual beige folding metal chair, causing its backrest to thud familiarly against the red and gray brick exterior wall behind him; lowered his forest green spiral notebook until it intersected the top front edge of a modest stack of drab-jacketed library books which rested upon his lap and began to transcribe the more fanciful images into a short story. In it, the cougar’s impending success was interrupted by a handful of natives who’d targeted his prey as their own. Having chosen a 15-year-old Lenape brave named Talli as its protagonist, he likewise conceived a fictional version of himself as the narrator ‒ leading to his eventual conception of peering through the lens of this and subsequent parallel visualizations as chronicled by the successive pens of 40 unique contemporary same-age narrators to detail the human evolution on the island wherein he’d grown up. On which millions-upon-millions of rats ‒ in near synchronicity with their hosts ‒ had likewise made their home…

Dark Psychology studies the human condition concerning man’s natural unconscious and emotional predisposition to prey and subjugate others.

He sleeps in the woods and he hunts in the hives! The King of the Knives! The King of the Knives! He dies where he doesn’t and lives where he thrives! The King of the Knives! The King of the Knives! He cuts all the husbands and preys on the wives! The King of the Knives! The King of the Knives! His voice is as loud as a battleship’s drives! The King of the Knives! The King of the Knives! He comes in the darkness and he takes all our lives! The King of the Knives! The King of the Knives! This is the song of the King of the Knives! – Children’s skipping chant, Tanith

here under the lamps are floating islands of pale light through which pass quickly bright men and women, who, for all their poverty and shabbiness, wear a certain look of unreality, an air of triumph, as if they had given life the slip, so that life, deceived of her prey, blunders on without them.

We are genetically designed to focus forward, to move towards what we want. Which means we are not prey. We are fucking hunters.

I’m so enthralled by Nick, that I’m willing to be his prey for what he has planned to come. I want to be at the mercy of this man for tonight and beyond.

The Mineral Kingdom comprises all substances which are without those organs necessary to locomotion, and the due performance of the functions of life. They are composed of the accidental aggregation of particles, which, under certain circumstances, take a constant and regular figure, but which are more frequently found without any definite conformation. They also occupy the interior parts of the earth, as well as compose those huge masses by which we see the land in some parts guarded against the encroachments of the sea. The Vegetable Kingdom covers and beautifies the earth with an endless variety of form and colour. It consists of organized bodies, but destitute of the power of locomotion. They are nourished by means of roots; they breathe by means of leaves; and propagate by means of seed, dispersed within certain limits. The Animal Kingdom consists of sentient beings, that enliven the external parts of the earth. They possess the powers of voluntary motion, respire air, and are forced into action by the cravings of hunger or the parching of thirst, by the instincts of animal passion, or by pain. Like the vegetable kingdom, they are limited within the boundaries of certain countries by the conditions of climate and soil; and some of the species prey upon each other.

[the true historian's] desired prey is primarily what has eluded memory and what has had every reason to elude it. After lengthy training in this struggle with the opaque, he will be able to test himself against Plutarchan figures, who are, in contrast, obscured by an excess of testimony - that thick carapace history secretes to keep them remote from us. And the end of his arrogant rise, the historian wants to meet Napoleon as if the latter were a stranger. At this point he becomes part visionary, and can muster the insolence to begin a book as Léon Bloy did: 'The history of Napoleon is surely the most unknown of all histories.

Then I would turn aside into some chapel, and even there, such was my disturbance, it seemed that the preacher gibbered "big thinks" even as the Ape Man had done; or into some library, and there the intent faces over the books seemed but patient creatures waiting for prey. Particularly nauseous were the blank expressionless faces of people in trains and omnibuses - they seemed no more my fellow creatures than dead bodies would be, so that I did not dare to travel unless I was assured of being alone. And even it seemed that I, too, was not a reasonable creature, but only an animal tormented with some strange disorder in its brain, that sent it to wander alone like a sheep stricken with the gid.

The words and ways this requires are…potent. They come at a price—power always does. This isn’t a matter of wrong or right, you understand, but merely the working of the world. If you want strength, if you want to survive, there must be sacrifice.” That’s not what Mags taught them. You can tell the wickedness of a witch by the wickedness of her ways. “So who paid your price?” He bends his neck to look directly at her, weighing something. “A fever spread through my parents’ village that first winter.” The word fever rings in Juniper’s ears, a distant bell toiling. “It was nothing too remarkable, except the midwives and wise women couldn’t cure it. One of them came sniffing around, made certain deductions…I took her shadow, too. And the sickness spread further. The villagers grew unruly. Hysterical. I did what I had to do in order to protect myself.” That line has smoothed-over feel, like a polished pebble, as if he’s said it many times to himself. “But then of course the fever spread even further… I didn’t know how to control it, yet. Which kinda of people were expendable and which weren’t. I’m more careful these days.” The ringing in Juniper’s ears is louder now, deafening. An uncanny illness, the Three had called it. Juniper remembers the illustrations in Miss Hurston’s moldy schoolbooks, showing abandoned villages and overfull graveyards, carts piled high with bloated bodies. Was that Gideon’s price? Had the entire world paid for the sins of one broken, bitter boy? And—were they paying again? I’m more careful these days. Juniper thinks of Eve’s labored breathing, the endless rows of cots at Charity Hospital, the fever that raged through the city’s tenements and row houses and dim alleys, preying on the poor and brown and foreign—the expendable. Oh, you bastard. But Hill doesn’t seem to hear the hitch in her breathing. “People grew frightened, angry. They marched on my village with torches, looking for a villain. So I gave them one.” Hill lifts both hands, palm up: What would you have of me? “I told them a story about an old witch woman who lived in a hut in the roots of an old oak. I told them she spoke with devils and brewed pestilence and death in her cauldron. They believed me.” His voice is perfectly dispassionate, neither guilty nor grieving. “They burned her books and then her. When they left my village I left with them, riding at their head.” So: the young George of Hyll had broken the world, then pointed his finger at his fellow witches like a little boy caught making a mess. He had survived, at any cost, at every cost. Oh, you absolute damn bastard.

The words and ways this requires are…potent. They come at a price—power always does. This isn’t a matter of wrong or right, you understand, but merely the working of the world. If you want strength, if you want to survive, there must be sacrifice.” That’s not what Mags taught them. You can tell the wickedness of a witch by the wickedness of her ways. “So who paid your price?” He bends his neck to look directly at her, weighing something. “A fever spread through my parents’ village that first winter.” The word fever rings in Juniper’s ears, a distant bell toiling. “It was nothing too remarkable, except the midwives and wise women couldn’t cure it. One of them came sniffing around, made certain deductions…I took her shadow, too. And the sickness spread further. The villagers grew unruly. Hysterical. I did what I had to do in order to protect myself.” That line has smoothed-over feel, like a polished pebble, as if he’s said it many times to himself. “But then of course the fever spread even further… I didn’t know how to control it, yet. Which kinda of people were expendable and which weren’t. I’m more careful these days.” The ringing in Juniper’s ears is louder now, deafening. An uncanny illness, the Three had called it. Juniper remembers the illustrations in Miss Hurston’s moldy schoolbooks, showing abandoned villages and overfull graveyards, carts piled high with bloated bodies. Was that Gideon’s price? Had the entire world paid for the sins of one broken, bitter boy? And—were they paying again? I’m more careful these days. Juniper thinks of Eve’s labored breathing, the endless rows of cots at Charity Hospital, the fever that raged through the city’s tenements and row houses and dim alleys, preying on the poor and brown and foreign—the expendable. Oh, you bastard. But Hill doesn’t seem to hear the hitch in her breathing. “People grew frightened, angry. They marched on my village with torches, looking for a villain. So I gave them one.” Hill lifts both hands, palm up: What would you have of me? “I told them a story about an old witch woman who lived in a hut in the roots of an old oak. I told them she spoke with devils and brewed pestilence and death in her cauldron. They believed me.” His voice is perfectly dispassionate, neither guilty nor grieving. “They burned her books and then her. When they left my village I left with them, riding at their head.” So: the young George of Hyll had broken the world, then pointed his finger at his fellow witches like a little boy caught making a mess. He had survived, at any cost, at every cost. Oh, you absolute damn bastard.

We were getting ready to close the store for what we thought might be as long as two months now. I was looking over the day’s reports when Dissatisfaction came into the building. His fingers roamed along the spines of the books, sometimes tracing one, pulling it out to read the first line. Since he’d read The Blue Flower, by Penelope Fitzgerald, he and I had compiled a list of short perfect novels. Short Perfect Novels Too Loud a Solitude, by Bohumil Hrabel Train Dreams, by Denis Johnson Sula, by Toni Morrison The Shadow-Line, by Joseph Conrad The All of It, by Jeannette Haien Winter in the Blood, by James Welch Swimmer in the Secret Sea, by William Kotzwinkle The Blue Flower, by Penelope Fitzgerald First Love, by Ivan Turgenev Wide Sargasso Sea, by Jean Rhys Mrs. Dalloway, by Virginia Woolf Waiting for the Barbarians, by J. M. Coetzee Fire on the Mountain, by Anita Desai These are books that knock you sideways in around 200 pages. Between the covers there exists a complete world. The story is unforgettably peopled and nothing is extraneous. Reading one of these books takes only an hour or two but leaves a lifetime imprint. Still, to Dissatisfaction, they are but exquisite appetizers. Now he needs a meal. I knew that he’d read Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels and was lukewarm. He called them soap opera books, which I thought was the point. He did like The Days of Abandonment, which was perhaps a short perfect novel. ‘She walked the edge with that one,’ he said. He liked Knausgaard (not a short perfect). He called the writing better than Novocain. My Struggle had numbed his mind but every so often, he told me, he’d felt the crystal pain of the drill. In desperation, I handed over The Known World. He thrust it back in outrage, his soft voice a hiss, Are you kidding me? I have read this one six times. Now what do you have? In the end, I placated him with Aravind Adiga’s White Tiger, the latest Amitav Ghosh, NW by Zadie Smith, and Jane Gardam’s Old Filth books in a sturdy Europa boxed set, which he hungrily seized. He’d run his prey to earth and now he would feast. Watching him closely after he paid for the books and took the package into his hands, I saw his pupils dilate the way a diner’s do when food is brought to the table.

He was a fool who shot his watchdog for disturbing his sleep, and so left himself a prey to the burglar; treat not your conscience so, but be grateful for its admonitions and cheerfully obey them.

erogenous

pubis

He and Jerry had worked together and sometimes taken lives together. They both knew their roles were not immutable. They were the hunters today, but they could be the prey tomorrow

In 2019 the leading medical journal the Lancet referred to this as ‘the utter evil of an industry that does indeed prey on those facing social peril and financial precarity’. Evil is not a word that medical journals throw around lightly.

The stood around the table, hovering over their prey,

I am a puny part of the great whole. Yes; but all animals condemned to live, All sentient things, born by the same stern law, Suffer like me, and like me also die. The vulture fastens on his timid prey, And stabs with bloody beak the quivering limbs: All’s well, it seems, for it. But in a while An eagle tears the vulture into shreds; The eagle is transfixed by shafts of man; The man, prone in the dust of battlefields, Mingling his blood with dying fellow men, Becomes in turn the food of ravenous birds. Thus the whole world in every member groans, All born for torment and for mutual death. And o’er this ghastly chaos you would say The ills of each make up the good of all! What blessedness! And as, with quaking voice, Mortal and pitiful ye cry, “All’s well,” The universe belies you, and your heart Refutes a hundred times your mind’s conceit. . . . What is the verdict of the vastest mind? Silence: the book of fate is closed to us. Man is a stranger to his own research; He knows not whence he comes, nor whither goes. Tormented atoms in a bed of mud, Devoured by death, a mockery of fate; But thinking atoms, whose far-seeing eyes, Guided by thoughts, have measured the faint stars. Our being mingles with the infinite; Ourselves we never see, or come to know. This world, this theatre of pride and wrong, Swarms with sick fools who talk of happiness. . . . Once did I sing, in less lugubrious tone, The sunny ways of pleasure’s general rule; The times have changed, and, taught by growing age, And sharing of the frailty of mankind, Seeking a light amid the deepening gloom, I can but suffer, and will not repine.

We believe that the reduction of the citizen to an object of propaganda, private and public, is one of the greatest dangers to democracy. A prevalent notion is that the great mass of the people cannot understand and cannot form an independent judgment upon any matter; they cannot be educated, in the sense of developing their intellectual powers, but they can be bamboozled. The reiteration of slogans, the distortion of the news, the great storm of propaganda that beats upon the citizen twenty-four hours a day all his life long mean either that democracy must fall a prey to the loudest and most persistent propagandists or that the people must save themselves by strengthening their minds so that they can appraise the issues for themselves.

Nothing had ever terrified her so much as sensing that animality under her own skin, the prey’s instinctive recognition of her predator, dressed in elegant linen.

Most all religions prey on the gullible and the needy–especially when they need money- and on the poor the sick, the lonely, the unlucky and the uneducated. Using mind control and a “blame the victim” mentality, it is insinuated that their victim’s misfortune is that they are not in God's favor and they simply need to believe and give more. This is downright sinister!

Bruce was sneaking through the shadows, hunting his prey, Jack. No way was he going to let that human call him a moose. He was a far superior being- a cat- and a ninja cat at that. Slowly he snuck into the shadows of a corner of the shelter and while Jack was walking backwards to place dirt blocks, Bruce snuck behind him.  Jack was just about to turn a corner when Bruce launched himself at the boy, landing straight on his head. “Yahhhh!” Jack screamed and fell off the shelter. Bruce leapt with ninja-like grace and landed on the half-built wall. He looked at Jack laying on the ground and began cleaning his paw.

They who have no central purpose in their life fall an easy prey to petty worries, fears, troubles, and self-pitying, all of which are indications of weakness, which lead, just as surely as deliberately planned sins (though by a different route), to failure, unhappiness, and loss, for weakness cannot persist in a power evolving universe.

This tour through some of the less admirable characteristics of humans and other animals shows that violence, extreme and lethal in some cases, is part of the struggle for life, and it is universal. Survival is at the expense of others who do not share your genes. We often talk of arms races in evolutionary theory, as the prey will evolve to beat the assets of the predator, and the predator will evolve in turn. This eternal conflict exists within species between the sexes, and between species at every scale.

You see, when you hunt, you get to play with your prey before you destroy it.

I am picky about the books I read. I don't waste time on head trash. I think Benjamin Disraeli said it best, "When I want to read a good book I write one.

Henry treated his ungrateful children with generosity, but he had no illusions. The royal chamber at Westminster at this time was adorned with paintings done at the King’s command. One represented four eaglets preying upon the parent bird, the fourth one poised at the parent’s neck, ready to pick out the eyes. “The four eaglets,” the King is reported to have said, “are my four sons, who cease not to persecute me even unto death. The youngest of them, whom I now embrace with so much affection, will some time in the end insult me more grievously and more dangerously than any of the others.

You’re not alone. I am here with you. I’m in the shadows, looking over your shoulder, hunting my pretty, ethereal prey as she slumbers, unaware that the biggest monster in all the realms serves as her protector and enemy. You’re never alone as long as I hunt you, Aria. I am never far behind you.

Partnis's fight-masters will tell you it's a science, this business of fists and knives. They'll tell you, keep a cool head, detached, control.' The man had given a quick shrug of his shoulders and spat.'He'll tell you the professional calculates, watches, plans.''Don't they'' Nona had turned back towards him.'Nature shaped us, little girl. Shaped the animals. Predators. Prey. Millions of years. Fighting, making children, dying. A cycle that hones each to its purpose. And what have we in common, wolf, eagle, man, under-killers, bears, all of us'' His eyebrows had shaped the question. Nona had waited for him to answer, wondering what exactly under-killers were.'Rage. We've got hate and anger and red fury, child. Saw it in you too. Got your teeth into that idiot boy. Didn't care that he might snap your arms off.' The man had gone down on one knee, face close to hers.'Here in the Corridor they teach you to put that anger aside. They got their reasons. Keep a calm head and you'll see more. But on the ice we know better than to let go of the weapons so many hard years have forged for us.' He had jabbed a blunt finger at Nona's chest.'Keep that fire. Use it. We're wild things us men, and when we remember it we're at our most dangerous.

Dr. Al Rosen. He is a former accounting professor, one of the most reputable forensic accountants in North America. Dr. Rosen has consulted or given independent opinions on over 1,000 litigation-related engagements. In recent years he has written two books, which have sounded alarm bells about the state of the accounting profession, but the profession makes more money by not heeding his warnings. What concerns him should concern us all. His first book was titled “Swindlers” and went into detail about how easy it is to financially dupe investors in Canada and the U.S. His book gave examples from cases he has handled in his career. His second book “Easy Prey Investors” is also a must read for anyone investing in Canada or the U.S. In it he reveals the tricks and traps of the accounting industry that no others in the industry have the courage or the moral freedom to voice. The story below, from the UK, gives a snapshot and a link to the kind of accounting fraud that Dr. Al Rosen has long been warning us about. January 15, 2018 On Monday, Carillion, the U.K.’s second-largest construction company, announced that it would go into compulsory liquidation. Carillion is a construction company, it also provides facilities management and maintenance services such as cleaning and catering in the U.K.’s National Health Service hospitals, providing meals in 900 schools, and maintaining prisons. It holds a number of government contracts, including for the construction of a high-speed rail link and for the maintenance of roads. 43,000 employees worldwide, 20,000 work in the U.K.; the company also has a significant presence in the

The Triassic Period, 248-206 million years ago, was a scary time to live. Most of the dinosaurs were meat eaters and liked to prey on each other. The fastest dinosaurs, the Coelphysis,

Simple answers to greater questions also create shadows, making it easier to hide the truth of things. Sadly, there are many who desire simplicity in all things, and they are easy prey for the shadows, for they are easily fooled.

She noted that the more gruesome or heinous the crime, the more interested the class of over 105 students would become.

One lewd student elicited laughter from his fellow students as he stood to mimic the professor as if she were a feeble woman with a hankering for foul language coupled with a dose of an unidentified spirit that left her words marred by slurring and drunken outbursts.

So, in her opinion, this pop quiz, that she herself wasn't prepared for, would have to do for the time being until she could locate the notes for today's lecture.

...men hunt by pretending to be the brothers of the prey they seek, and women hunt by impersonating the mothers of their prey.

Saw-Scaled Viper     Alternative Names: Echis, Carpet viper, Little Indian viper Where in the world? Africa, Middle East, Central Asia and Indian subcontinent Habitat: Desert, fields, towns and cities Common prey: Lizards, frogs, scorpions, centipedes and large insects Size: 40 to 60 cm (15 to 23 inches) Lifespan: 25 to 30 years Conservation status: Not classified   Description: The saw-scaled viper or carpet viper may be a small snake, only able to grow as long as 60 centimeters or a little less than two feet, but it is considered one of the deadliest snakes in the world. In fact, some scientists say that wherever this snake is found, it is responsible for about 80% of human deaths from snake bites.   There are three main reasons why the saw-scaled viper is so deadly. Firstly it is the saw-scaled viper’s aggressive behavior. It has a nasty temper and is easily provoked.   Secondly, it has a very quick strike, which when combined with a very defensive attitude, can be lethal to humans living nearby. The saw-scaled viper strikes so quickly that even the distinctive sawing sound it makes with its scales when agitated is not warning enough.   Thirdly, the saw-scaled viper’s venom is highly toxic to humans, with the venom from the females being two times more toxic than the venom from the male snakes. Its venom destroys red blood cells and the walls of the arteries, so within 24 hours, the victim can die of heart failure. There is an anti-venom available, and as long as this is administered very shortly after the bite, the victim can be saved.   Like other snakes, the saw-scaled viper’s diet consists of small animals like mice and lizards, as well as large insects. It hunts at night, hiding behind rocks and when it sees its prey, it coils and launches itself quickly and with accuracy, often biting its prey at the first attempt. The bite kills the prey within seconds, making it easy for the viper to drag it away or eat it on the spot.   Visit IPFactly.com to see footage of the saw scaled viper in action (Be Aware: your method of reading this kindle book may not support video)

She is still forming her conclusions but, above all, is convinced that their actions are borne of instinct: fixed patterns that take them to their source of food, to their safe havens, to their mates, and, ultimately, to their death, since their predators learn these patterns as surely as if they, too, had read Maud’s book.

The sword that has been forged against us is already blunted; the instruments of war which the enemy is preparing have already lost their point. God has taken away in the person of Christ all the power that anything can have to hurt us. Well then, the army may safely march on, and you may go joyously along your journey, for all your enemies are conquered beforehand. What shall you do but march on to take the prey? They are beaten, they are vanquished; all you have to do is to divide the spoil. You shall, it is true, often engage in combat; but your fight shall be with a vanquished foe. His head is broken; he may attempt to injure you, but his strength shall not be sufficient for his malicious design. Your victory shall be easy, and your treasure shall be beyond all count.

You aren’t really going to let me go, are you?” The man asked resignedly. Shaking his head, the boy replied, “No. You preyed on children, sir. I can feel the darkness of your soul. You will never change. You are a stain on any world in which you reside, and I will not abide you in my reality.” With those words, the boy reached out, took the man’s head in his small but powerful hands, and twisted savagely. The man’s neck broke like a rotten twig, and his lifeless body slumped to the floor, arms still bound to the column behind him.

During his two-year term, Hunt introduced the inspections of tenement houses, appointed school nurses, provided food inspection and dental services for school children, closed illegal gambling halls, introduced a plan to improve city sewers, introduced the regulation of loan sharks who preyed on the poor, and settled several strikes.

Every time we do wrong, every time we depart from the truth, every time we commit a dishonest, unworthy act, do a mean, contemptible thing, we lessen the Omnipotent grip upon us, and then we become a prey to all sorts of fears, apprehensions, dreads, and doubts.

generalized imperative that all femininity be translatable into the logic of the market. If the body is a useful part of the ‘package’, then all the better. Men too are increasingly prey to this imperative, to be an all-round self-seller, but it is in this heavily politicized continuum from (bad) hijab-wearer to (good) proto-porn actress that the contemporary ideology of work is most clearly seen – and it is primarily played out in the circulation of female bodies.

with a torn quilt coiled around him like a snake suffocating its prey. Beads

I've spent my entire life trying to find those who could guide me and help me. I then wrote books based on what I learned but kept seeking such people. But it came a point when I realized I could only count on myself. The vast majority of the world is nothing more than a filthy pack of pigs bathing on their own grandiose sense of self, their egotism, and playing roles in life that they actually don't own. This world is full of ignorant souls preying on others and sucking the life of the few that could go beyond the majority. It is indeed a miracle that we can still find such unique personalities.

the counter turned to look at her, running his gaze over her like a predator sighting prey, and she clamped her jaw shut and forced her breathing to slow. Think, dammit, slow down and think! She’d prepared for this. She wasn’t screwed - she knew the day might come, so she’d made a plan and put all the pieces into place so she’d be ready. She just needed to slow down and think it through. The plan, she knew the plan backward and forward. Step one… She blotted the worst of the

Two of the most violent criminals in US history were Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer. Bundy preyed on girls and women; Dahmer on boys and men. Both violent sex addicts gave themselves wholly over to dark compulsions. They murdered dozens of innocent people to gratify out-of-control lust. Law enforcers eventually caught and convicted these men, but only after reigns of terror and death. The state of Florida executed Ted Bundy in 1989 at age 42. A fellow prisoner bludgeoned Dahmer to death in 1994 while he served a life sentence. Dahmer was 34. These two monsters shared another characteristic in common: they both professed Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. They received his forgiveness while in prison. Many of us would exclaim, “No way!” I did. How can such miserable excuses for human beings be let off the hook by a just God? If this is true that means even Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Mao Tse-tung, and Pol Pot could have repented and God would have forgiven them. That’s entirely too much grace and mercy in my book! Such unmerited and massive forgiveness feels unfair and impossible to believe, but it’s consistent with biblical accounts of Jesus’s character and teachings. He lives by a different book than we do. Even when put to death unjustly, he still forgives.

Finally, he pulled his face to mine again, and said, “I won’t bite.” A fire as intense as an explosion slid up my belly and danced inside my chest. Nothing seemed to matter at that moment except one thing. I needed him. I was no longer the prey, I was the hunter. He was mine…all mine.

The all-wise Father, knowing the benefit accruing to his sons through temptations, and being resolved to help them, gives them severe conflicts, casts them down to the depths, gives them bread and straw to teach them self-denial. He visits, raises, and proves them and gives them courage to preserve them against the risings of pride and deceptions and their irritation at their falls. Then do not fear temptation, brother, when you have such a counterweight as God's love for you. He is better served by you when you are tempted, for you suffer for him, but when you are consoled; your work is done for you.   Be sure to turn within yourself and seek God whenever anything happens that annoys you, like the dove that, when pursued by a bird of prey flies away and enters a safe place of refuge. You too should enter the refuge of your heart, where you will find God, and every adverse circumstance will be to you a messenger of grace, as this Letter declares. Then the words of Isaiah will be fulfilled in you. “And a man shall be as when one is hid from the wind, and hides himself from a storm, as rivers of water in drought, and the shadow of a rock that stands out in a desert land.

That’s the problem with radical Islamic terrorists or jihadists or lunatics, they don’t think like normal people. Go figure.

The famous seventeenth-century Ming painter Chou Yung relates a story that altered his behavior forever. Late one winter afternoon he set out to visit a town that lay across the river from his own town. He was bringing some important books and papers with him and had commissioned a young boy to help him carry them. As the ferry neared the other side of the river, Chou Yung asked the boatman if they would have time to get to the town before its gates closed, since it was a mile away and night was approaching. The boatman glanced at the boy, and at the bundle of loosely tied papers and books—“Yes,” he replied, “if you do not walk too fast.” As they started out, however, the sun was setting. Afraid of being locked out of the town at night, prey to local bandits, Chou and the boy walked faster and faster, finally breaking into a run. Suddenly the string around the papers broke and the documents scattered on the ground. It took them many minutes to put the packet together again, and by the time they had reached the city gates, it was too late.

Aleksandr’s match with the big Mongolian known only as ‘Genghis’ had been going for over eight minutes. No prior fighter had lasted more than two minutes. They circled each other like two Bengal tigers that had both happened upon the same prey after weeks of starvation.

Not a big intellectual, he’d nevertheless spent an entire summer reading an English translation of Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust’s À la recherché du temps perdu while knitting together the web of a major crack gang that spread over the Twin Cities. He couldn’t read French, but the book had made him want to learn the language; he’d just never had time.

Every predator is a prey.

The voracious insects waited for storms like this one, then rode the winds in search of prey.

Those who read many books are like the eaters of hashish. They live in a dream. The subtle poison that penetrates their brain renders them insensible to the real world and makes them prey of terrible or de lightful phantoms. Books are the opium of the Occident. They devour us. A day is coming on which we shall all be keepers of libraries, and that will be the end.

In answering the above objection we have at the same time indicated the scope of Expropriation. It must apply to everything that enables any man — be he financier, mill-owner, or landlord — to appropriate the product of others’ toil. Our formula is simple and comprehensive. We do not want to rob any one of his coat, but we wish to give to the workers all those things the lack of which makes them fall an easy prey to the exploiter, and we will do our utmost that none shall lack aught, that not a single man shall be forced to sell the strength of his right arm to obtain a bare subsistence for himself and his babes. This is what we mean when we talk of Expropriation; this will be our duty during the Revolution, for whose coming we look, not two hundred years hence, but soon, very soon.

So the poor wretches swarm over the baron’s lands, making roads, draining marshes, building villages. In nine years he begins to tax them. Five years later he increases the rent. Then he doubles it. The peasant accepts these new conditions because he cannot find better ones elsewhere; and little by little, with the aid of laws made by the barons, the poverty of the peasant becomes the source of the landlord’s wealth. And it is not only the lord of the manor who preys upon him. A whole host of usurers swoop down upon the villages, multiplying as the wretchedness of the peasants increases. That is how things went in the Middle Ages. And to-day is it not still the same thing?

When you stand in front of someone and you intimidate that person by saying: "Do you know who I am?"; this means that you don't know really who you are. The answer is simple! You are a man, a candidate to death, an easy subject to ignore or to forget, the prey of what you ignore.

Confucius was passing by Mount Tai when he saw a distraught woman weeping by a grave. Resting his hands on the wooden bar at the front of his carriage, he listened to her wailing. Then, he sent a student to speak the following words: “A great misfortune must have befallen you, that you cry so bitterly.” She answered, “Indeed it is so. My husband and his father have both been killed by tigers, and now my son, too, has fallen prey to them.” Confucius asked, “Why do you remain here?” She answered, “No callous government rules here.” Confucius said, “Remember that, my students. Callous government is more ravenous than tigers.” “The Book of Rites

THE WARRIOR CODE 1. Defend your Clan, even with your life. You may have friendships with cats from other Clans, but your loyalty must remain to your Clan, as one day you may meet them in battle. 2. Do not hunt or trespass on another Clan’s territory. 3. Elders and kits must be fed before apprentices and warriors. Unless they have permission, apprentices may not eat until they have hunted to feed the elders. 4. Prey is killed only to be eaten. Give thanks to StarClan for its life. 5. A kit must be at least six moons old to become an apprentice. 6. Newly appointed warriors will keep a silent vigil for one night after receiving their warrior name. 7. A cat cannot be made deputy without having mentored at least one apprentice. 8. The deputy will become Clan leader when the leader dies or retires. 9. After the death or retirement of the deputy, the new deputy must be chosen before moonhigh. 10. A gathering of all four Clans is held at the full moon during a truce that lasts for the night. There shall be no fighting among Clans at this time. 11. Boundaries must be checked and marked daily. Challenge all trespassing cats. 12. No warrior may neglect a kit in pain or in danger, even if that kit is from a different Clan. 13. The word of the Clan leader is the warrior code. 14. An honorable warrior does not need to kill other cats to win his battles, unless they are outside the warrior code or it is necessary for self-defense. 15. A warrior rejects the soft life of a kittypet.

Until this night, this awful night, he’d had a little joke about himself. He didn’t know who he was, or where he’d come from, but he knew what he liked. And what he liked was all around him-the flower stands on the corners, the big steel and glass buildings filled with milky evening light, the trees, of course, the grass beneath his feet. And the telephones-it didn’t matter. He liked to figure them out, master them, then crush them into tiny hard multicolored balls which he could then juggle or toss through plate glass windows when nobody was about. He liked piano music, the motion pictures, and the poems he found in books. He also liked the automobiles that burnt oil from the earth like lamps. And the great jet planes that flew on the same scientific principles, above the clouds. He always stopped and listened to the people laughing and talking up there when one of the people laughing and talking up there when one of the planes flew overhead. Driving was an extraordinary pleasure. In a silver Mercedes-Benz, he had sped on smooth empty roads from Rome to Florence to Venice in one night. He also liked television-the entire electric process of it, with tiny bits of lights. How soothing it was to have the company of the television, the intimacy with so many artfully painted faces speaking to you in friendship from the glowing screen. The rock and roll, he liked that too. He liked the music. He liked the Vampire Lestat singing “Requiem for the Marquise”. He didn’t pay attention to the words much. It was the melancholy and the dark undertone of drums and cymbals. Made him want to dance. He liked the giant yellow machines that dug into the earth late at night in the big cities with men in uniforms, crawling all over them; he liked the double-decker buses of London, and the people-the clever mortals everywhere-he liked, too, of course. He liked walking in Damascus during the evening, and seeing in sudden flashes of disconnected memory the city of the ancients. Romans, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians in these streets. He liked the libraries where he could find photographs of ancient monuments in big smooth good-smelling books. He took his own photographs of the new cities around him and sometimes he could put images on those pictures which came from his thoughts. For example, in his photograph of Rome there were Roman people in tunics and sandals superimposed upon the modern versions in their thick ungraceful clothes. Oh, yes, much to like around him always-the violin music of Bartók, little girls in snow white dresses coming out of the church at midnight having sung at the Christmas mass. He liked the blood of his victims too, of course. That went without saying. It was no part of his little joke. Death was not funny to him. He stalked his prey in silence; he didn’t want to know his victims. All a mortal had to do was speak to him and he was turned away. Not proper, as he saw it, to talk to these sweet, soft-eyed things and then gobble their blood, break their bones and lick the marrow, squeeze their limbs to dripping pulp. And that was the way he feasted now, so violently. He felt no great need for blood anymore; but he wanted it. And the desire overpowered him in all its ravening purity, quite apart from the thirst. He could have feasted upon three or four mortals a night.

The tour of the South Caucasus in 2018 ends where the book began, in the mountains. The extraordinary natural features of the Caucasus cross all political boundaries, and its extraordinary landscape and outstanding biodiversity are its often-hidden glory. Foreign visitors are awestruck by these landscapes, still far less developed than the alpine zones of western Europe. The World Wildlife Fund has named the wider Caucasus region—stretching into Russia and Turkey—one of thirty-five “biodiversity hotspots” on the planet, with over 1,650 indigenous plants and animals in nine climate zones. To name but three examples of this biodiversity: the mountains of Georgia and Azerbaijan contain more species of oak than western Europe, as they survived the last Ice Age; a few mountain leopards still prowl the highlands of Armenia; and less than 200 “goitered gazelles” are to be found on the borders of Azerbaijan and Georgia. Some natural spectacles draw visitors from all over the world. From late August to early October, birdwatchers come to the Black Sea coast of Georgia to see the annual migration southwards of millions of birds of prey through a 10-kilometer-wide corridor between the sea and the Lesser Caucasus Mountains known as the “Batumi bottleneck.” On October 2, 2014, after days of rain kept the gates of the corridor closed, an astonishing 271,000 birds were counted flying through and darkening the skies.

And even though preternaturals routinely preyed on humans when they were alone or in small groups, everyone sane understood that humans in large numbers were both paranoid and extremely dangerous. Even a single lucky human could slay a mighty dragon. As time passed into the modern era their weapons and technology made them even more deadly. The annihilation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had silenced even the insane.

Alligators like on the banks by the creeping moss/ And use the sinews of their prey to do their daily floss.

vices.’[34]  This minion pride will stir up the soul to resist, yea, in a manner kill, some sins, that she may boastingly show the head of them, and blow the creature up with the conceit of himself above others. As the Pharisee, who through pride bragged that he was not as the publican—so that pride, if not looked to, will have to do everywhere, and hath a large sphere it moves in.  Nothing indeed (without divine assistance) the creature hath or doth, but will soon become a prey to this devourer.  But I am not to handle it in this latitude.

urethra.

The wolf scrambled onto the ledge and stopped, knowing it had cornered its prey.

in his house, than turn him out of it to become a prey to Satan. O sinners, did you know—which you cannot till you come over to Christ, and embrace him as your Lord and Saviour—what the privileges of Christ’s servants are, and what gentle usage saints have at Christ’s hands, you would say these are the only happy men in the world which stand continually before him.

You have to understand that all we see is beauty. Yes, human passions are animalistic and raw but that is nothing to be hidden. We believe that it is when we are closest to nature, a vestige of nature that can never be taken out of us. So when you are out there and your inner animal comes out, know that we are seeing a jaguar hunting prey, a flower blossoming, and a bird swooping through the air unhindered by the ground.

Patience was what made a man or woman dangerous. Put a plan together, wait for the perfect opportunity. That’s what the criminals who didn’t get caught, the generals who won battles, and the predators who got their prey all had in common. Knowing when to strike at the best time, and when the your opponent both least suspected it and was least prepared.

The subtle approach is more likely to get you what you want. Remember, though, an alpha man generally takes the lead in this area, asking questions and trying to determine whether you'll make a satisfactory sex partner. Follow his lead. The questions are often framed in self-disclosure. He tells you something, you have the opportunity to tell him something; this creates trust. Try discussing sex in a light-hearted, abstract manner. "How shall I proceed if the seduction is successful?" I inquired. “If the signals are good, it's time to make your move. One of you must surrender. In all probability it will be you, because even if you initiated the seduction, he will probably have taken over the role of pursuer somewhere along the line. The roles of 'hunter' and 'prey' have been decided through thousands of years of evolution, and fall naturally into place," Dr. Henderson said. "Seduce, surrender and enjoy!" were the final words from my sensual education professor at the Bahriji School.

I looked at him during our conversation, and I purposely stood facing him, with an erection, while under the shower. Pretending it was completely natural for me to be speaking to him in this condition, he tried not to look below my waistline, but his eyes occasionally wandered to my crotch I caught a glimpse of his growing erection. I continued to present my throbbing cock to him, under the running water. I had a feeling he was likely prey, from his body language.

January 2013 Continuation of Andy’s Message (part two)   …It was great to skinny dip in such a beautiful environment. It was difficult not to fall prey to these two attractive, brown-skinned boys with their enticing brown eyes, exotic smiles and seductive charms. In turn, they found my masculinity irresistible. That evening we frolicked under the silvery moon.               Amidst the gentle rolling waves, we lay on the shoreline. I was in heaven when they enveloped me in a dizzying spell of unbridled resignation. Both of them took turns lapping at the fiber of my existence, teasing and caressing my engorgement with agile dexterity. I could no longer hold off my essence and sprayed on their faces. We shared my dripping rivulets in a passionate three-way kiss. When they continued suckling my penis, I was steered back to life. I had to possess their tenderness. I took turns pleasuring their puckering fissures as they begged for my stiffness with irrepressible gusto. Boy, did they love my proclivity! The louder their groans, the harder I pounded. When I withdrew from one, the other was poised for insertion. They couldn’t get enough of my onslaught. I was in ecstasy as I whisked back and forth between these two insatiable accomplices.               The more acute my plundering, the more uncontrollable their hardness throbbed. Anak, no longer able to withhold his enthusiasm, spewed into Taer’s throat while I plucked away at his friend’s rucking furrow. Taer’s twitching tightness had me deposit my fill into his receiving orifice. Anak wasted no time in devouring the oozing drippage around my pulsating phallus, still enshrouded within his buddy’s tunnel.               To pleasure himself, the unquenchable Taer wanted my bobbing organ down his throat. I obliged. In a trancelike delirium, the Filipino released jets of potent effusions onto his slender abdomen. Our tongues swirled in erotic kisses as we shared our libations in frantic elation.               Unwilling to relinquish this enchanted evening, we dove into the shimmering ocean, only to emerge rejuvenated, ready to resume the sequel of our sexcapade.

nations never see themselves clearly in the mirror, much less when war preys on their minds.

Even in the era that we think of as the “good old days” children were never truly safe. Monsters walked among us, even then. In this case, though, the monster in question was not an adult that preyed on a child, it was what the

Let no soul, even the most miserable, fall prey to doubt; for, as long as one is alive, each one can become a great saint, so great is the power of God’s grace. It remains only for us not to oppose God’s action. (283)

But, I knew better than to fall prey to lust, and most of all I knew that it was hatred that bound us, not love.

Judah, your brothers will praise you; your hand will be on the neck of your enemies; your father’s sons will bow down to you. “You are a lion’s cub, O Judah; you return from the prey, my son. “Like a lion he crouches and lies down, like a lioness—who dares to rouse him? “The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.

I open the book while resting my back on the chair and read. Because the book gives me the perfect description, play by play, on how to pull off a spotless crime

At least he only preyed upon the wicked. Well, not counting the angels. In his defense they were pests, always trying to get people to repent after a lifetime of being shitty. It was a stupid loophole that gave heaven more souls than it had earned.

As I looked on, through prismatic layers of light, dry-lipped, focusing my lust and rocking slightly under my newspaper, I felt that my perception of her, if properly concentrated upon, might be sufficient to have me attain a beggar’s bliss immediately; but, like some predator that prefers a moving prey to a motionless one, I planned to have this pitiful attainment coincide with one of the various girlish movements she made now and then as she read, such as trying to scratch the middle of her back and revealing a stippled armpit—but fat Haze suddenly spoiled everything by turning to me and asking me for a light, and starting a make-believe conversation about a fake book by some popular fraud.

“Nature works in circles. Trees lure prey and hide predators. Predators leave behind carcasses so that they might be absorbed into the soil and feed the trees.” -THE BOOK OF THE ETERNAL ROSE

You need to pray and apply faith for your own sake, so that when the clouds are grey, you will not become the enemy’s prey.

The term “niche construction,” first used widely by biologist Richard Lewontin, the Alexander Agassiz Research Professor at the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University, represents the process by which an organism alters its own (or another species’) environment to help increase its chances of survival. A beaver building a dam and a spider spinning a web are examples of niche construction. So is a bird building its nest or a rabbit burrowing a hole. When animals migrate, they are seeking a favorable niche within which to flourish. Each of these activities assists the organism in achieving its basic needs—gathering food, protecting offspring, keeping clear of prey, seeking shelter from inclement weather—and thus raising the likelihood that it will pass its genes on to the next generation. Scientists are just beginning to appreciate that niche construction may be as important to evolution as natural selection. In the book Niche Construction: The Neglected Process in Evolution, Oxford lecturer F. John Odling-Smee and his colleagues write, “Niche construction should be regarded, after natural selection, as a second major participant in evolution. Rather than acting as an ‘enforcer’ of natural selection through the standard physically static elements of, for example, temperature, humidity, or salinity, because of the actions of organisms, the environment will be viewed here as changing and coevolving with the organisms on which it acts selectively.”17 What this can mean for neurodiverse individuals is that instead of always having to adapt to a static, fixed, or “normal” environment, it’s possible for them (and their caregivers) to alter the environment to match the needs of their own unique brains. In this way, they can be more of who they really are.

Unhappiness and misfortune attend those who are voluntarily feeble. “Their defect deprived them of the joy derived from happy efforts. They will be the prey of duplicity and untruth. “They are the vanquished in life, and scarcely deserve the pity of the conqueror; for their defeat lacks grandeur, since it has never been aurioled by the majestic strength of conflict.

Because you have an instinctive horror at the idea of such a crime, to the point where it has never even entered your head,’ the old man continued. ‘For, in simple and permitted matters, our natural appetites warn us not to exceed the boundaries of what is permissible for us. The tiger, which spills blood in the natural course of things, because this is its state of being, its destiny, needs only for its sense of smell to inform it that a prey is within reach; immediately it leaps towards this prey, falls on it and tears it apart. That is its instinct, which it obeys. But mankind, on the contrary, is repelled by blood. It is not the laws of society that condemn murder, but the laws of nature.’ Dantès was struck dumb: this was indeed the explanation of what had gone on, without him knowing it, in his mind – or, rather, in his soul: some thoughts come from the head, others from the heart. Dumas, Alexandre. The Count of Monte Cristo (Penguin Classics) (p. 133). Penguin Books Ltd. Kindle Edition.