Chris Moriarty > Quotes

“The trouble with friends was that you couldn’t get rid of them. There was no way to take back a friendship in the wake of betrayal or disappointment. The friendship, and everything that went with it, stayed. It just became unreliable, like an abandoned house; you still knew where all the rooms were, and which stairs creaked underfoot, but you had to check every floorboard for rot before trusting your weight to it.”
― Chris Moriarty, Spin State

“You don’t trust people because they’re a sure bet or even a good risk. You trust them because the risk that you’ll lose them is worse than the risk that they’ll hurt you.”
― Chris Moriarty, Spin State

“Arkady looked at the other man. he felt that he was actually seeing him as a physical being for the first time.....He tried to imagine that body with Bella, with any woman, and found the idea...not repulsive exactly, but incomprehensible. How would it work exactly? And how would either of them, knowing nothing of their lover's body, needs and desires, ever be able to satisfy the other?”
― Chris Moriarty, Spin Control

“Well, that explains the repeated commission of wanton acts of poetry. I was starting to feel like I was being punished for my earthly sins by being trapped in an A. S. Byatt novel.”
― Chris Moriarty, Ghost Spin

“Mo nodded toward the back room just as Rabbi Kessler shuffled out, waving an open book at Mo and grinning from ear to ear. ‘So listen to this, Mo! Here’s how Rabbi Halberstam answers your question. And what’s more, he quotes Rashi, Rabbi Akiva, and Ramban, all of whom he completely disagrees with. And you know what? I completely disagree with all of them—and him too!’ Rabbi Kessler chuckled in gleeful anticipation. ‘So roll up your sleeves, Mo. We’ve got our work cut out for us!”
― Chris Moriarty, The Watcher in the Shadows

“Oy, veh! And where were the Italian speakers yesterday when we needed them?”
“Today we need Russian!”
“Russian? Who needs Russian? I need Litvaks! Are there any Litvaks in here? Anyone here even know what the heck a Litvak is?”
“And I need—excuse me, dearie, what language is that you’re speakin’?—Well, gracious me, I don’t even know what I need! A mind reader, maybe!”
― Chris Moriarty, The Watcher in the Shadows

“So ask him. He could round up every goose in Manhattan before we could even figure out where Sam’s parents live now.”
Wolf looked blank.
“Uh…kosher poultry?” Sacha prompted. “Litvaks?”
Now Wolf and Lily were both staring at him like he was speaking a foreign language.
“Okay, all the big Jewish gangsters either come from Latvia or Galitzia. Ever since anyone can remember, the Galitzians ran the numbers rackets, and the Litvaks—that’s Minsky and Magic, Inc.—ran the kosher poultry business.”
“I take it there’s big money in kosher poultry?” Wolf asked, with a bemused look on his face.
“Well, I don’t know about that. But right around the time Minsky took over Magic, Inc., the Litvaks took over the numbers runners too.”
“And what happened to the Galitzians?” Lily asked.
Sacha grinned wickedly. “We don’t talk about that.”
― Chris Moriarty, The Watcher in the Shadows

“You've been handed a chance in life, and I want you to grab it with both hands and not look back.”
― Chris Moriarty, The Inquisitor’s Apprentice

“What do I know from dybbuks? I’m a dyed-in-the-wool atheist. The only people in the Lower East Side who know from dybbuks are rabbis. And they’re all just gutless bourgeois reactionaries who want us to let the Morgaunts of the world stomp all over us so we can reap our reward in heaven or Brooklyn—neither of which, allow me to point out, has ever been scientifically proven to exist.”
― Chris Moriarty, The Inquisitor’s Apprentice