G.S. Jennsen > Quotes

“We don’t get to choose what happens to us—but we always get to choose how we react to it.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“The brain represented the most complex organism ever to exist, and impossible to tame. Morality could not be spawned by tweaking a few genes or shutting off a few neurons. Not yet. So though humanity conquered the very stars, it remained unable to conquer the darkness within.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“You’re covered in blood again.”

“I really am.”

“Why are you always covered in blood when I wake up after being unconscious?”
“Usually for the same reason you were unconscious, I think.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo

“She burst into her hotel room pulling her blouse over her head with one hand while she yanked her shoes off with the other.

No way was she going to face an alien invasion in heels and silk.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo

“Noah gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Just out of curiosity, is this the stupidest thing you’ve ever done?”

“It wouldn’t be fair to rank them.” Caleb gunned the engine.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Transcendence: Aurora Rising Book Three

“She climbed into the shuttle and got in his personal space. “Who are you working for?”

The man spat in her face.

She rolled her eyes and wiped the spittle off her cheek. Then she punched him square across the jaw before grabbing him by the throat. “WHO are you working for?”
― G.S. Jennsen, Dissonance

“People feared what they did not understand, and they without a doubt did not understand her. Those who believed they did least of all.

She was something new.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Dissonance

“She pointed to the wreckage of one of the frigates in the distance. Half the ship had landed atop one of the towers on the edge of the city, the other half on the flatland beyond. “You didn’t…do that, did you?”

He shrugged with proper dramatic flair. “I did say I came to rescue you. They were in my way.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Transcendence: Aurora Rising Book Three

“His punch knocked her back a meter into the wall. His fist had moved of his own volition, carrying a rage and frustration all its own.

To his dismay, she didn’t fall. People so small as her always fell.

No tears pooled in her eyes; instead they flared golden amber as she rubbed her jaw and pushed off the wall to stand rigid straight. A peculiar smile danced across her lips as blood trickled from the corner of her mouth and down her chin.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo

“Alexis, please mind your mouth. Cursing in Russian is still cursing.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“A pulse. Beat-beating against her palm. Alive.

Beat by beat the bottomless whirlwind of perceptions and data and images and sensations careening through her mind—so many how can this tiny skull hold them all—began to abate in time to the rhythm of not her pulse, but his.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Transcendence: Aurora Rising Book Three

“She returned his salute with a sly smile—a rare enough event that he eyed her suspiciously.

“Admiral Solovy, are you wearing a shit-eating grin because we won here today, or is there something else I should know?”

“There’s something else you should know.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Abysm

“You look like you’ve been on a month-long bender. Have you?”

“No, Ken, I have not. I’ve just had a long week.”

Walked the streets of a city bathed in blood and stood amid a hundred thousand corpses. Negotiated a three-way peace treaty among opposing factions of a warring alien species who’d previously held me captive. Bullied the Metigen leadership into doing my bidding. Found out we’re not the real humans, and the real humans are currently enslaving the real universe. Oh, and I think I’m addicted to my ship. How was your week?

“Nothing a shower and some food won’t fix.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Abysm

“Alex screamed and lashed out at the points of light from within, desperate for something tangible to rage against. Caleb wrapped his arms around her from behind and coaxed her out while glaring at the Metigen in loathing.

Then he lessened his hold on her to a single hand. Together they turned their backs on the alien and began walking away.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Dissonance

“The Anadens have a somewhat different perspective on death.”

“On account of not having to deal with it, sure. Personally, I think their little immortality contrivance has destroyed the value of life for them.”

“It brought you back.”

“Thus I reserve the right to be hypocritical on this particular topic.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Requiem

“I wouldn't be your best and most marvelous friend in the galaxy if I didn’t point out there might be a few negative consequences from all…” she gazed upward and twirled her hand in the air “…this.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“Time slowed as metal shards enveloped her like shattered glass. None pierced her of course, but it seemed as though she might be able to reach out and pluck one from the sky.

She settled for stretching out an imagined hand, palm upturned, and letting a shard fall through it untouched like the ghost she had become.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo

“You ask me to make peace with the monsters who did this?”

She didn’t even look around at ‘this.’ “Yes. The alternative is extinction. There’s no coming back from that—no new weapon to fire when no one is left and you’ve no universe left to fire it in.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Dissonance

“There are two kinds of light – the glow that illuminates, and the glare that obscures.”   — James Thurber”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“Alex thrust her hand and half her arm into the labyrinth of light.
Her stare blanked, and in the halo of the matrix her eyes and glyphs blazed so radiantly she looked as if she were being consumed by a primordial fire.

“She just stuck her hand into Machim Command’s central server matrix!”

Caleb smiled, watching on in blatant awe. “She does that.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Relativity

“Deep in the recesses of her mind, she knew they were probably watching. They watched everything, after all.

Let them watch. Let them see what it meant to be human. To live.

Let them see what it meant to love, and be loved in return.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo

“She thought he might have said her name, but it was background radiation accompanying the hum in her ears and the symphony in her head—

—a song of quantum mechanics and trajectory calculations and astroscience physics and where to go, where to go, where to…”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo

“The Artificial’s speech pattern was an idiosyncratic mix of awkward and colloquial. It was unexpectedly endearing. “I just have good instincts. Mostly I love being in space.”

But you are not ‘in’ space. You are in your starship and your starship is in space. It is not so different than being on a planet.

“Oh, Valkyrie, you have no idea.”

Tell me then.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo

“That excuse only works until you discover the person is merely an individual like any other.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“Yes, she loved her ship more than she had loved him. But what she loved even more was what it gave her: freedom, and the key to the marvels of space. It gave her the stars, and she doubted she could ever love anything or anyone more than she loved the stars.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“2 SECONDS

He was on her in an instant to brace her against the wall. She kicked and clawed at her unseen attacker, skin and irises ablaze in caustic gold.

She fired anew, and the point-blank shot broke through his defenses, grazing his hip. He ignored the harsh sting to bring his Daemon up between them.

1 SECOND”
― G.S. Jennsen, Dissonance

“She had missed him for a while, missed his warm smile and tender yet expert touch. But she had also welcomed the absence of the invisible leash which had tugged her back to Earth more often than she liked, which had whispered of duties to another and required explanations and justifications for every excursion. And eventually even the good memories had faded into the background, replaced by the thrill of new endeavors.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“Children are turning themselves into monsters and, quite frankly, it is your fault. You initiated the creation of this technology, then you allowed it to slip through your fingers.”

Miriam’s jaw tightened. “I disagree, but now is the least optimal time imaginable for assigning blame. People are dying, and I will not stand around debating semantics with you while they are.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Dissonance

“He simply preferred the sensation of soil beneath his feet and wind in his hair, of fresh, non-recycled air which carried on it the scent and taste of life. He preferred what was solid and real, where if you could see it you could touch it, feel its texture between the tips of your fingers. As far as he knew, no one had ever touched a star. Not even her.”
― G.S. Jennsen, Starshine

“Individuals reacted in any number of ways to extreme stress and, relatedly, to impending death.

A non-negligible percentage of people reacted in a manner which could be summed up by, ‘Screw it, I’m going out in style!”
― G.S. Jennsen, Vertigo