G.D. Penman > Quotes

“The Goblin Shark isn’t the first ship that Reznik has sailed on—far from it. Ever since he picked himself up out of the dirt of the Badlands and walked out to the Red Ocean near the island of Sudrabi, he never looked back. His life had been a constant procession of new ships ever since. Some he takes by force, like The Goblin Shark. Some of them take him on as crew, but all of these have discovered very quickly that they made a mistake”
― G.D. Penman, Chibuzo: The Goblin Shark

“There are a few unfortunate souls on the streets as she waddles along, but every one of them swerves out of her way. It isn't clear whether Mama's height is a result of some aftermath of the big war or if, as she maintains, she comes from a long line of short people, but either way her elbows are always level with something soft and delicate and she has no compunctions about lashing out at anyone that gets too close.”
― G.D. Penman

“middle managers were necessary to a business in the same way that mosquitos were necessary to a functional ecosystem. They would both have no noticeable impact if they were removed.”
― G. D. Penman, Dungeons of Strata

“Well rested” wasn’t usually a status effect that he managed to achieve in real life, relying far more often on “Over-caffeinated.”
― G.D. Penman, Dungeons of Strata

“Her interest was in the future, what was coming next, what would happen next, how she could intercept danger before it struck. She never thought on the past, and how things had come to be how they were. He supposed that between the two of them, they almost managed wisdom. Almost.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“It was as though they were children with no grasp of the real consequences of failure.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“New Amsterdam was a city the way decapitation was a paper cut. Both could make a person bleed and both would hurt like hell, but only one made bystanders start screaming.”
― g.d. penman, The Year of the Knife

“Nobles who had never been denied anything in their lives now found the lack of access to this curious new creature in their midst to be a great frustration”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“Sully had a thing about birds - she wasn't particularly fond of them, but they seemed to be fond of her, showing up in flocks whenever she was upset. Marie was able to judge her mood by the number of seagulls outside the apartment at any given moment.”
― G.D. Penman, The Year of the Knife

“Bones that weren’t hers, had been pushed inside her flesh, stretching her out of shape. Twisting her into this new Orsina. This girl who’d do anything to graduate from some school she’d never heard of. To make herself powerful, so that somebody might give her shelter from the world. She didn’t want that. She’d never wanted any of that. These were the wants of the Prima and Harmony. They were in her head, speaking in her voice. Telling her how she should live. Who she should strive to become. She needed to think. She needed to get her brain back under control. She was spiraling. She was losing herself.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“People didn’t like being told what to do at the best of times. When you were telling them it was for their own good, it was infinitely worse. And when you were telling them how to build their character – essentially telling them who they should be – they really did not like it.”
― G.D. Penman, Dungeons of Strata

“relaxed by the sounds of other living people about her. The desolate silence of her own well-insulated chamber had been too alien to a girl more accustomed to being trod on in the night, the silence stretching out and leaving vacuous openings for her thoughts and fears to dwell in.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“Frightened fools love their fire.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“It was exactly what Harmony had taught her, to hold herself up and never let others tear her down. It was just strange to hear she had taken the lesson to heart instead of merely nodding along with whatever her supposed mentor said.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“With all of that busywork done, there was nothing left to do but wait as Lindsay came leaping and bounding down the waterfall stairs, shouting into the guild-chat. “Give me the new stabby! My stabby stabby stabby!” He knew her well enough to wait until she was actually down in the main chamber to turn the kris over to her. It wouldn’t have been helpful if she’d stalled out on the stairs. She danced around in a circle, kissing the sinister looking blade in between outbursts. “Oh, my precious stabby. I shall love him and squeeze him and call him stabby.”
― G.D. Penman, Dungeons of Strata

“Drive, my dear. Ambition. The desire to succeed and the will to pursue it. It is my hope that you are ready and willing to put in the work required to make something of yourself.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“Artemio had no romance in his head. He had no room for it there since he was using the massive amount of space it apparently occupied for things like thinking.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“In his experience, the commoners’ allegiance went to whoever kept food in their belly, kept a roof over their head, and whipped them the least. When it came to the noble houses, loyalty was bought for a marginally higher price, but it was still bought.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“Civility was a mask, but it was armor too. So long as he maintained appearances, his enemies could not work against him openly either.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound

“She had to think like the dragon. Unity of purpose. She half remembered something about that in the Owl’s endless books.”
― G.D. Penman, Shadebound