Mark Sima > Mark's Quotes

“Rafe smiled again. “I think Aleana can teach you how to work in a team and maybe you can teach her to be less reckless.”
So it was that Raimund found a new home in the Den of Thieves, and he and Aleana became partners and best friends.”
― Robert Reid, The Emperor

“Sometimes truths are what we run from, and sometimes they are what we seek.”
― R.D. Ronald, The Elephant Tree

“Night vision. Unclip your bows. Ready. Fly.” ”
― Andri E. Elia, Yildun: Worldmaker of Yand

“I walked past Malison, up Lower Main to Main and across the road. I didn’t need to look to know he was behind me. I entered Royal Wood, went a short way along a path and waited. It was cool and dim beneath the trees. When Malison entered the Wood, I continued eastward. 
I wanted to place his body in hallowed ground. He was born a Mearan. The least I could do was send him to Loric. The distance between us closed until he was on my heels. He chose to come, I told myself, as if that lessened the crime I planned. He chose what I have to offer.
We were almost to the cemetery before he asked where we were going. I answered with another question. “Do you like living in the High Lord’s kitchens?”
He, of course, replied, “No.”
“Well, we’re going to a better place.”
When we reached the edge of the Wood, I pushed aside a branch to see the Temple of Loric and Calec’s cottage. No smoke was coming from the chimney, and I assumed the old man was yet abed. His pony was grazing in the field of graves. The sun hid behind a bank of clouds.
Malison moved beside me. “It’s a graveyard.”
“Are you afraid of ghosts?” I asked.
“My father’s a ghost,” he whispered.
I asked if he wanted to learn how to throw a knife. He said, “Yes,” as I knew he would.  He untucked his shirt, withdrew the knife he had stolen and gave it to me. It was a thick-bladed, single-edged knife, better suited for dicing celery than slitting a young throat. But it would serve my purpose. That I also knew. I’d spent all night projecting how the morning would unfold and, except for indulging in the tea, it had happened as I had imagined. 
Damut kissed her son farewell. Malison followed me of his own free will. Without fear, he placed the instrument of his death into my hand. We were at the appointed place, at the appointed time. The stolen knife was warm from the heat of his body. I had only to use it. Yet I hesitated, and again prayed for Sythene to show me a different path.
“Aren’t you going to show me?” Malison prompted, as if to echo my prayer.”
― K. Ritz, Sheever's Journal, Diary of a Poison Master

“The world was becoming a very puzzling place for me. I didn’t understand why bad people were allowed to tell good people what to do. What kind of world would allow that to happen?  ”
― Steven Decker, Child of Another Kind

“When you’re in The System, like after being arrested, you’re no longer a participant. You’re being processed. Instead of an easy to ignore, well-greased cog, you become a sharp edge that needs to be ground down.”
― Alan Bradley, The Sixth Borough

“Often I felt like two people. One went into the world and did the living for the other, who was stuck in an endless moment of knowing. Yesterday was today and hereon in.”
― Michael Wyndham Thomas, The Erkeley Shadows

“Any first rate novel or story must have in it the strength of a dozen fairly good stories that have been sacrificed to it. A good workman can't be a cheap workman; he can't be stingy about wasting material, and he cannot compromise. Excerpt taken from On the Art of Fiction by Willa Cather circa 1920.”
― Willa Cather

“Have you noticed that the imbecile always smiles? Man's first frown is the first touch of God on his forehead. The touch of thought.”
― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

“there is one word that can be the guide for your life- it is the word reciprocity.”
― Pearl S. Buck, Peony

“I'm either really, really brave or really, really stupid.”
― James Dashner, The Journal of Curious Letters

“Translation is that which transforms everything so that nothing changes.”
― Günter Grass