275 quotes
It also meant that their reaching out to the artifact had gotten it to reach back. Her experiment was working.
She’d expected success to feel less like fear.
Leviathan Falls (2021)
The end-of-year celebration was different. It was a nested series of lies. A minefield scattered with gold nuggets, opportunity and disaster in visibly mingled.
The Mercy of Gods (2024)
Owning your own racing ship wasn’t even wealth. It was like speciation. It was conspicuous consumption befitting ancient Earth royalty, a pharaoh’s pyramid with a reaction drive.
Caliban's War (2012)
“I never thought I’d feel wind again. I never thought I’d be outside. It’s so beautiful.”
Amos glanced around the ruins and shrugged. “That’s got a lot to do with context, I guess.”
Nemesis Games (2015)
I mean, I’m all for forgiveness and bygones being bygones, but it’s easier to stomach that after the assholes are all dead.”
Persepolis Rising (2017)
There was justice to be had.
He just couldn’t afford it.
Caliban's War (2012)
The holy fool who’d dragged the solar system into war and seemed utterly blind to the damage he caused. An idealist. The most dangerous kind of man there was.
Caliban's War (2012)
“I mean it happened at the same time, but that’s the thing. Time doesn’t actually work like that. ‘The same time’ is a weird linguistic fantasy. It doesn’t exist. Simultaneity doesn’t act like this.”
Persepolis Rising (2017)
Violence is what people do when they run out of good ideas. It’s attractive because it’s simple, it’s direct, it’s almost always available as an option. When you can’t think of a good rebuttal for your opponent’s argument, you can always punch them in the face.
Abaddon's Gate (2013)
“So you’re trying to get me prepared for one of my crew dying?”
“Historically speaking, humans are pretty much at a hundred percent on that.”
Nemesis Games (2015)
Josep grunted. “Could be prophecy.”
“Could be that the universe doesn’t give a shit about us or anything we do and your mystic bullshit’s just a way we try to pretend otherwise.”
Babylon's Ashes (2016)
They were willing to risk a hole in the ship emptying out half the ship’s air rather than let her up to the bridge. It was sort of gratifying to be scarier than sudden decompression.
Caliban's War (2012)
I’ve been through a lot of hearings about one damn thing and another. Most of the time they’re exercises in ass covering. If the unvarnished truth ever came out at one, it would be because someone screwed up.
Caliban's War (2012)
He remembered his mother saying The only right you have with anyone in this life is the right to walk away. He thought about his father’s need to frame everything as an epic struggle between himself and the universe.
Memory's Legion: The Complete Expanse Story Collection (2022)
The sad fact of the human species that High Consul Duarte understood so well was that you could never overcome tribalism and jingoism with an argument. Tribalism was an irrational position, and it was impossible to defeat an irrational position with a rational argument.
Persepolis Rising (2017)
His head hurt. His back hurt. He couldn’t feel his legs. It was all distressing until his mind came back enough for him to realize it meant he hadn’t died.
Nemesis Games (2015)
He hadn’t thought about it. It was a crisis, and in a crisis you did what needed doing. Stopping to think was a short path to panic. He didn’t have time for that.
The Mercy of Gods (2024)
Karen tried to divine from the news whether they were winning the war or losing it. He might just as well have swirled tea leaves and looked for patterns there.
Livesuit (2024)
Distributed responsibility is the problem. One person gives the order, another carries it out. One can say they didn’t pull the trigger, the other that they were just doing what they were told, and everyone lets themselves off the hook.
Tiamat's Wrath (2019)
In order to be heard by the oppressing class, one must speak as a member of it. Not only the language, but the diction. The accusation of tyranny, however well-founded in fact, is dismissed unless it is delivered in the manner that power recognizes as powerful.
Nemesis Games (2015)