Richard Holleb

“Why would an otherwise learned and intelligent person dabble in make-believe and fantasy? Are these not childish tendencies for an adult? The Oracle understands that it’s not logical, and yet fiction challenges the human mind and allows thinking to be enlarged. Humans are storytellers.”
― Peter Cawdron, The Oracle

“Humans are storytellers. Whether it is their own history or some imaginary place, such as Mt. Olympus or Hades, they weave narratives around points of view rather than immutable facts. Initially, the Oracle was dismissive of the various myths it learned over thousands of orbits. The plays and legends of humanity seem childlike, but over time, the Oracle learned there was an inherent wisdom in these stories. As outlandish as they seem, they often reveal deep truths about the nature of humanity. It appears that, for all the progress of this species and its emerging civilization, its nature remains etched in the past. The Oracle understands the legends of humanity aren’t true, but that they capture universal truths, and it finds this aspect of humanity fascinating and worthy of transmission back to Pythia.”
― Peter Cawdron, The Oracle

“we not only have avoided a world war with the Soviets, but have seen no wars between superpowers for one of the longest stretches in the modern era; the number of people living in extreme poverty worldwide has dropped by 1.3 billion—the fastest reduction in poverty in human history; more than 2.6 billion people have gained access to modern sanitation and electricity for the first time; child and infant mortality has dropped by more than half, as has global illiteracy; thirty countries and territories have legalized same-sex marriage for more than 1.1 billion citizens. Such a story would”
― David Wong, Futuristic Violence and Fancy Suits

“Didn’t matter where you went, there the bottles would be, calling him with their mute beauty, their amusing shapes, their sharp-colored labels that all read one thing: “Drink Me!” I want to, he thought. It built, it rolled uphill, it crushed all before it, the beast called The Thirst was pure mercy for the woeful, the terminally depressed, the abandoned warrior. It made the voices go away, the pictures stop, the throbbing in his steel hip quiet down. Death—but, before that, disgrace—was also on the road, and he knew it. And he knew it didn’t matter. Death sometime, even soon and in shame, weighed little against the mercy of the now. Most days he wasn’t strong enough to fight it off, and today hadn’t been decided yet.”
― Stephen Hunter, Front Sight: Three Swagger Novellas