David Wong > Quotes

“[A] flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“behind every monster there’s just another monster, forever.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“People don’t want solutions. They want novelty.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“The more they hate you, the more they love each other.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“To at least feel like I was doing something, I said, “Deadworld? Is that where you’re from?”
“No, dude. That’s where you’re from. It’s where we are now. This place, it’s a horror show. If the guy next to you decides to knock you out of this world forever, he can do it with just a piece of metal or, hell, even his bare hand. You blobs, you sit there, chillin’ in this room and I can smell the rot of dead animals soaking in the acid of your guts. You suck the life from the innocent creatures of this world just so you can clock another day. You’re machines that run on the terror and pain and mutilation of other lives. You’ll scrape the world clean of every green and living thing until starvation goes one-eight-seven on every one of your sorry asses, your desperation to put off death leadin’ to the ultimate death of everybody and everything. Dude, I can’t believe you ain’t all paralyzed by the pure, naked horror of this place.”
After a long, long pause John said, “Uh, thank you.”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“You hire the right people and trust them to get it done.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“Being against power is easy, Zoey, because you never, ever need to offer solutions or take risks.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“everyone has a blind spot that they avoid so strongly that they don’t even feel the blade slipping into it.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“Ma’am,” I said, “if your dog was dabbling in the occult while you had her it’s best you tell us now. We’re experts.”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“After you told me the part about Las Vegas, you know how I said it was the stupidest story I had ever heard?”
“You didn’t say that.”
“Well, I was thinkin’ it. But I’ve decided I owe that Las Vegas story an apology because this last thing made that one look like The Grapes of Wrath.”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“She needed to remind herself not to accidentally press the spot on the seam of her T-shirt that would make the cat start singing a sea shanty consisting entirely of meows.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“if one possessed the skill to craft sufficiently elaborate and convincing lies, then no other skills were really necessary.”
― David Wong, Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick

“New technology is not good or evil in and of itself. It's all about how people choose to use it.
David Wong”
― David Wong

“Do they know they make the honey for you? Or do they work tirelessly because they think its their own choice?”
― David Wong

“Let me give you a tip: if you’re ever the victim of a terrible crime—like, say, your kid goes missing—and you see the cops consulting with a couple of white trash–looking dipshits in their late twenties, it’s time to worry. It’s not because John and I are incompetent at what we do—and I assure you, we are—but because you need to start asking yourself a very hard question. Not “Will I get my child back?” but “Do I want to get my child back?”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“Our apocalyptic fiction depicts a world in which humans revert to the savagery of the jungle the moment our institutions fall, survivors tearing each other to pieces even as they are dying of plague or stalked by the undead. In our real history, we have been in that situation many times—left without government or law enforcement, none of the modern institutions we take for granted. From each of these scenarios what emerged was not savagery, but cooperation. When the pillars of our culture crumble, we rebuild them.

[...] Mankind is, and always has been, much greater than the sum of its parts. A lone human may appear to be nothing special if observed, say, blearily standing in line at a convenience store at two in the morning, or spitefully ripping a toy from the hands of a middle-aged woman in the chaos of a Black Friday sale. Yet, the combined efforts of these confused and volatile primates result in gleaming cities and majestic flying carriages. They have split the atom and peered across the universe.

In the blink of an eye, they have acquired the powers of gods.

This, I believe, is the fate of humanity: to colonize the stars over the next thousand years, to set down settlements in our solar system and others. Then, many centuries from now, one of our descendants will be strolling along some marvelous domed paradise on some distant planet and will see a drunken youth in offensive clothing, vomiting in an alley outside a pub. The man will look sidelong at the youth in that shameful state, shake his head, and mutter to himself that humanity is a ridiculous, doomed species, incapable of anything worthwhile.

He will believe it, because the true, wonderful, terrible, fearsome power of humanity is otherwise almost too much to comprehend. I recognize that not all of you share my faith, but you must admit that if gods are real and have observed humanity’s evolution from afar, they must shudder at the possibilities.”
― David Wong

“Society is doomed for one very simple reason: it takes dozens of men working months with millions of dollars in materials to build a building, but only one dumb-ass with a bomb to bring it down.”
― David Wong

“How many bites do you have to take out of a shit sandwich before you figure out it's shit?”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“So you see, fear is just another manifestation of insecurity. What humans want most of all, is to be right. Even if we’re being right about our own doom. If we believe there are monsters around the next corner ready to tear us apart, we would literally prefer to be right about the monsters, than to be shown to be wrong in the eyes of others and made to look foolish.”
― David Wong

“Inappropriate laughter is the universal first sign of madness.”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“To John, I muttered, "so . . . she's still here."
John snapped, "She won't fucking go! This is fucking ridiculous."
Joy looked up from her phone and said, "I dumped his stash. He's not happy."
"You . . . what?"
"The meth, the Adderall, the weed, all of it. Down the toilet it went. Whoosh. Bye-bye."
John stabbed a finger at her. "You don't get to make that decision."
I said, "You're arguing with a swarm of shape-shifting bug monsters, John."
Joy said, "And losing!”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“Quando mi misi comodo, una gamba si spezzò, facendo piegare di colpo la poltrona di trenta gradi. Mi appoggiai alla spalliera con nonchalance, come a voler dare a vedere che fosse esattamente quello che mi aspettavo accadesse.”
― David Wong

“You’re only twenty- two. Trust me, in ten years you’d be a completely different person anyway.”
― David Wong

“To John, I muttered, "so... she still here."
John snapped, "She won't fucking go! This is fucking ridiculous."
Joy looked up from her phone and said, "I dumped his stash. He's not happy."
"You . . . what?"
"The meth, the Adderall, the weed, all of it. Down the toilet it went. Whoosh. Bye-bye."
John stabbed a finger at her. "You don't get to make that decision."
I said, "You're arguing with a swarm of shape-shifting bug monsters, John."
Joy said, "And losing!”
― David Wong

“Those men died doing what they loved—screwing up my most simplest goddamned instructions”
― David Wong

“I had half hoped I would find the psychiatrist’s office closed today, as if the aftermath of a shooting rampage would be treated like a national holiday. No such luck. People got to make a paycheck I guess.
I barged in before I realized there was somebody else in the waiting room. Should have looked in through the window or something, I would have waited outside if I'd known, since the potential for really awkward conversation seems pretty high in the waiting room of a psychiatrist's office.”
― David Wong, This Book Is Full of Spiders

“Be there when they need you, and keep being there when they stop being funny. Every time they make a joke around you, they're doing it because they instinctively and reflexively think that's what they need to do to make you like them. They're afraid that the moment the laughter stops, all that's left is that gross, awkward kid everyone hated on the playground, the one they've been hiding behind bricks all their adult life.”
― David Wong

“I know the Goliath Fucking Bird-Eating Spider can't fly because if it could, it would have a different name entirely. We would call it sir.”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“And I see her and she’d look up at me with those green eyes and I think, hey, saving the world, that’s Hollywood bullshit. The best I can do is save this little bit of the world, this little corner that me and this girl stand in.”
― David Wong, John Dies at the End / This Book Is Full Of Spiders / What the Hell Did I Just Read

“Come midafternoon, I found myself at work, standing behind a counter, trying to peel the magnetic antitheft tag off a DVD with my fingernail (a DVD is a disc that plays movies, if they don't have those by the time you read this).”
― David wong