M. K. Hobson: Thing

““Still feeling guilty, are we? I’d have thought you’d be over that by now.”
“I have a nettlesome little thing called a conscience,” Emily hissed. “Ever hear of it?”
“They’re out of fashion in New York,” Stanton said, and though she guessed she was joking, he didn’t sound humorous.”

M. K. Hobson book The Native Star

Source: The Native Star (2010), Chapter 5, “The Aberrancy” (p. 74)

Feeling , Fashion

“You know, there’s one thing about you that always astonishes me. The longer you talk, the wronger you get.”

M. K. Hobson book The Native Star

Source: The Native Star (2010), Chapter 23, “The Skycladdische and the Sangrimancer” (p. 331)

“Credomancy may seek to exploit the human desire for a tidy narrative where an unblemished romantic hero vanquishes all obstacles, but such ideals have very little to do with reality. Reality requires pragmatism and compromise. Men fail. Women fail. There are no heroes, only human beings who somehow find the strength to behave heroically, no matter how many times they have been unable to do so in the past. If you understand that, Miss Edwards—if you truly and deeply understand that, then you will understand the most powerful thing anyone with a heart can understand.”

M. K. Hobson

“And what’s that?” Emily said softly.
“That love is not enough. But it’s a start.”
Source: The Hidden Goddess (2011), Chapter 19, “The Ruined Woman” (p. 291)

Love , Women , Men , Understanding

“Emily looked at him for a long time. There were so many things she wanted to know—but she wanted not to know them even more. She didn’t want any more answers. He had been the one thing she could trust, the one person she could rely on. She wanted to beg him to be that way again. But it wasn’t him who had changed. It was her. It was her own credulity she really wanted back. And credulity, like virtue, could be lost only once.”

M. K. Hobson book The Native Star

Source: The Native Star (2010), Chapter 17, “The Cockatrice” (p. 237)

Way , Change , Time , Personality

““They say that they’re a punishment on godly people for allowing sin to walk the earth unanswered—”
“Who is this ‘they’ you’re always referring to?” Stanton glared at Rose, his eyes gleaming with unhidden malice. “Your mongoloid Aunt Kindy? Your drunken Uncle Sal? Or are you talking about the slack-jawed hacks who bang out those dime novels for a bottle of whiskey and the price of a flophouse?”
Rose stared at him, her mouth open in astonishment. But Stanton pressed on, his voice flat and awful.
“Or maybe you’re just using the word ‘they’ as so many pea-brained idiots use it, as a cowardly rhetorical device, an excuse to say the things you really believe without giving anyone the chance to judge you for the narrow-minded, stupid creature you are.””

M. K. Hobson book The Native Star

Source: The Native Star (2010), Chapter 15, “Ososolyeh” (pp. 211-212)

People , Stupidity , Chance

““I’m sorry Mr. Stanton, really I am. I didn’t mean to miss it. Things… happened.”
“Oh, well. Things happened. How nice to have that cleared up.””

M. K. Hobson

Source: The Hidden Goddess (2011), Chapter 5, “Dreadnought” (p. 65)

“I’m sorry Mr. Stanton, really I am. I didn’t mean to miss it. Things…happened.”

M. K. Hobson

“Oh, well. Things happened. How nice to have that cleared up.”
Source: The Hidden Goddess (2011), Chapter 5, “Dreadnought” (p. 65)