Glen Cook: Trending quotes (page 3)

“He was pursuing a running debate with his own guilts and ghosts—unless he was spouting proverbs and aphorisms, most of the meanings fairly obvious but a few convolute and obscure. He was particularly fond of “Fortune smiles. And then betrays.” He just could not get into bed comfortably with the truth that he had made that bed himself. He still had difficulty separating “ought to be” from “the way things really are.””

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 8, “Taglios: Trouble Follows” (p. 389)

Truth , Smile , Way

“Every time I see a mirror I’m amazed. I end up wondering who’s taken over the outside of me. A disgusting old goat, from the look of him. The kind I used to snicker at when I was twenty. He scares me, Stance. He looks like a dying man. I’m trapped inside him, and I’m not ready to go.”

Glen Cook book The White Rose

Source: The White Rose (1985), Chapter 10, “Bomanz’s Story” (p. 497)

Time

“Good morning. I’m honored but I’m also pressed for time. If you have something to discuss please get to the point. I’m an hour behind schedule and didn’t budget time for socializing.”

Glen Cook Dreams of Steel

Source: Dreams of Steel (1990), Chapter 27 (p. 323)

Time

“It was a day ripped full-grown from the womb of despair.”

Glen Cook book Shadows Linger

Source: Shadows Linger (1984), Chapter 5, “Juniper: Marron Shed” (p. 229)

Despair

“Seemed to have made peace with the bad times. Some manage that with comparative ease. Others remain crippled for life. Those are not the sort who remain soldiers. They become ex-soldiers and get intimate with wine or poppies.”

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 131, “Around Taglios: Aerial Recon” (p. 736)

Life , Peace , Wine , Time

“I went back to staring tomorrow in the face. Better than looking backward. But tomorrow refused to shed its mask.”

Glen Cook The Black Company

Source: The Black Company (1984), Chapter 1, “Legate” (p. 34)

“The best of the diviner breed are never wrong because they never set anything in stone.”

Glen Cook book She Is the Darkness

Source: She Is the Darkness (1997), Chapter 79 (p. 555)

“Life with me and the Company has not been anything like happily ever after. Reality has a way of slow-roasting romance.”

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 5, “An Abode of Ravens: Headquarters” (p. 383)

Life , Way , Reality

“Nobody had any ideas. The questions just sort of lay there like dead fish too ripe to be ignored and too big to shove out of the way.”

Glen Cook book The Silver Spike

Source: The Silver Spike (1989), Chapter 19 (p. 499)

Way , Idea , Question , Fish

“The sky? Dark as the inside of a priest’s heart, isn’t it?”

Glen Cook book Bleak Seasons

Source: Bleak Seasons (1996), Chapter 20 (p. 55)

Heart

“All is not lost. But neither is it found.”

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 133, “Glittering Stone: A Dangerous Game” (p. 741)

““Best way out,” Elmo observed laconically, “would be to kill everybody who knows anything, then all of us fall on our swords.”
“Sounds a little extreme,” Goblin opined. “But if you want to go first, I’m right behind you.””

Glen Cook book Shadows Linger

Source: Shadows Linger (1984), Chapter 24, “Juniper: Shadow Dancing” (p. 326)

Way

“He knew that he had screwed up but he was the kind of guy who, after he shoots his mouth off, cannot back down or admit any failing. The world is full of those people. All of us would be better off if their fathers would strangle them as soon as they showed signs of being that way. This particular fool was willing to sacrifice an army rather than admit his error.”

Glen Cook book She Is the Darkness

Source: She Is the Darkness (1997), Chapter 30 (p. 368)

People , World , Fools , Way

“There are, of course, a thousand sophistries spewed by those who wish to deny individuals the opportunity to choose. Which is an arrogant presumption of a divine scale.”

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 10, “An Abode of Ravens: Recovery” (p. 397)

“He had gained all the power he had dreamed of then—and had not known a moment of peace since.”

Glen Cook book She Is the Darkness

Source: She Is the Darkness (1997), Chapter 5 (p. 288)

Peace , Dreams

“Soldiers live. And wonder why.”

Glen Cook book Water Sleeps

Source: Water Sleeps (1999), Chapter 60 (p. 212; repeated on p. 356)

“It was the wee hours of the morning, when even the heartbeat of the world had trouble thumping on.”

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 104, “Taglios: View from the Protector’s Windows” (p. 676)

World

“I’ve always known people for whom a goal was everything, who never thought nothing about the consequences of the goal achieved.”

Glen Cook book The Silver Spike

Source: The Silver Spike (1989), Chapter 36 (p. 562)

People

“But with royalty you never know. They think differently than real people. The real world never quite seems to reach them.”

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 126, “Taglios: Royal Return” (p. 720)

People , World , Thinking

“That damned rain had a personal grudge. It got no heavier but it never let up. Yet to east and west I saw light that indicated clear skies in those directions. The gods, if such existed, were laying on the misery especially for me.”

Glen Cook book Shadow Games

Source: Shadow Games (1989), Chapter 28, “Back to Scouting” (p. 148)

God , Light , Personality