Rebecca Schaeffer > Quotes

“Pain. Everyone is always in pain. Whether it’s a loose hangnail, a sore joint, a cramped back muscle—something. No human is never not in at least a minute amount of pain.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“He snorted. “You do remember that I’m on the wrong side of the cage now?”
She turned to him, and the floor was cool against her cheek. “I’m pretty sure we’re both on the wrong side of the cage.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“I know.” His hand ran across the floor, making shapes in the nonexistent dust. “Have you ever seen those shows starring serial-killer main characters? Dexter? Hannibal? Some of those sexy vampire ones the mafia funds to lure victims to them? They make all sorts of excuses for the serial killers. ‘It’s okay, he’s killing bad guys.’ ‘It’s okay, because it happened offscreen.’ I hate those. I hate when people do that to me. When they try to make me sympathetic, moralize all the decisions that aren’t moral.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“Sometimes she could see the monster inside him. And sometimes he made her see the monster inside herself.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Only Ashes Remain

“They thought because the US was a “first-world country,” they didn’t have black markets or human trafficking. Idiots.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“She would never cross a line she didn't want to again. Not because of something as transient as a conscience, but because of something more concrete. Resolve.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“He’s been found evil. And if you tell someone they’re bad long enough, they’ll believe it. Especially children.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Only Ashes Remain

“No one is perfect. No one is exactly who you want them to be. There is something in every person, even your closest friend, that you don’t like.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Only Ashes Remain

“But the problem with losing your morality is that sometimes it takes other things with it. You don’t realize the things that are important to you, in order to be the person you want to be, until you’ve already damaged them beyond repair.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“I won't ever say I'm a good person. I don't want to be. I like who I am - and I don't want to lose that. I don't want to lose me. Because it felt like that's what happened to all of them. They'd lost themselves to their monsters.”
•pg.332 - Kovit”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“I just don’t want you to ever not see me. I know so many people see me as nothing more than a tool for pain. But the other side of the coin is when people make excuses for everything I do. They blame it on a tragic past. On what I am. As though WHO you are is defined by WHAT you are.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Only Ashes Remain

“I think, more than anything, people like to feel superior to others. Canadians like to feel that they’re better than Americans. Americans love to feel they’re better than the whole world. And when people feel superior, it makes it harder for them to see the problems just beneath the surface. They don’t want to believe them, to face them, because if they did, can they really claim to be superior anymore?”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Only Ashes Remain

“When did you cross over into serial killer territory, Nita?”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“Morals were nothing but things to be manipulated with. They were tools you could use against others, and weapons others could use against you.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“The kind of break that stemmed from too much loss and betrayal, and you could either let the world break you or you could storm through the world and fill the cracks with the blood of those who'd hurt you until you were a semi-balance of whole again.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“In a weird, twisted way, Nita almost felt like Kovit’s and her stories were opposite facets on the same diamond. Different, sure, but similar in some fundamental ways. It made Nita feel . . . weird. Squiggly, not-quite empathy, but sort of fear-empathy . . . something. Nita couldn’t put it into words.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“Sometimes freedom comes at an ugly price.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“Is that blood? Are you literally drinking the blood of your enemies now?'
'Yes.' She passed him the bottle. 'Want some?'
'Yes.' He took a long swig”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“I think, more than anything, people like to feel superior to others... And when people feel superior, it make it harder for them to see the problems just beneath the surface. They don't want to believe them, to face them, because if they did, can they really claim to be superior anymore?”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“She wondered if it was impossible to be all of yourself at the same time, because yourself was too complicated. So people broke it down into bits and pieces and wore some of them some days and others different days.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“Our greatest fears are warped reflections of our greatest desires," he explains. "Fear only has power when what we're afraid of takes away the things we value most.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, City of Nightmares

“This place isn't a town — I shouldn't call it that. It's a shopping mall. And the only people here are the buyers, the sellers, and the products.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“I made some mistakes. If I had a chance to do it over, knowing what I know now, I'd change some of my plans," Nita admitted, the words sticking a little in her throat. "But I don't know that I regret the choices I made. They seemed right at the time, and I learned a lot from them."
•pg.80 - Nita”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“One day,someone will have more anger then fear, and they will come, and they will kill him- and on the day, I will light a candle for the loss of a friend who could have been, and then I will celebrate the death of the monster that was.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“Native to Southeast Asia, zannies were skilled torturers, notoriously amoral, and universally despised. Over the years, zannies had spread across the world, and their small population made them highly paid and in higher demand. Every dictator and genocidal maniac worth his salt had a zannie on staff.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“Anytime a Zannie is the only one enjoying a situation,you know something has gone terrible wrong.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“...not even bones, only ashes remained when Nita rose. Not even her mother could put herself back together after being blown to literal smithereens.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“Sometimes it was hard to reconcile that all the different facets of Kovit were the same person.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, When Villains Rise

“Piece after piece went into little glass jars. Fingernails were pried off and dropped into vials with little clinks. Hair was shaved off and tied with a ribbon. The skull was sawed off and the brain scooped out, and portioned into little Tupperware containers like a zombie’s lunch. Then Nita stapled the top of the skull back on so they could wave the head around if needed for leverage.”
― Rebecca Schaeffer, Not Even Bones

“All lives are hard. But some leave you alive, and some leave you dead.”
•pg.240 - Nita”
― Rebecca Schaeffer , Only Ashes Remain