Justin Cronin, The City of Mirrors
26 quotes
"For the first time in my life, I felt the pain of missing people I had not yet left."
"I would not say I was a nonbeliever; rather, that I gave little if any thought to celestial concerns. It did not seem to me that God, whoever he was, would be the sort of god to take an interest in the minutiae of human affairs, or that this fact released us from the duty to go about our lives in a spirit of decency to others."
"The heart, once broken, stayed broken."
"Consider the species known as man. We lie, we cheat, we want what others have and take it; we make war upon each other and the earth; we harvest lives in multitude. We have mortgaged the planet and spent the cash on trifles."
"How wonderful to be read to. To be carried from this world and into another, born away on words."
"The memory was unpleasant; he'd taken an instant disliking to the man. Compounding Peter's distrust, Chase was wearing a necktie, the most incomprehensible article of clothing in the history of the world."
"I wanted to kill them. No, not kill. "Kill" is too dull a word for that which I desired. I wanted to annihilate them. I wanted to tear them limb from limb. I wanted to crack their bones and bury my face in the wet remains. I wanted to reach inside their chests and yank out their hearts and devour the bloody meat as the last stray current twitched the muscle and watch their faces as they died."
"It's children, he thought, that give us our lives; without them we are nothing, we are here and then gone, like the dust."
"She thought she should take a moment to pray. But, as she was holding a loaded rifle, conventional prayer did not seem entirely suitable. Sister Peg hoped that God would help her, but it was her belief that He much preferred for people to attend to themselves. Life was a test; it was up to you to pass it or not. She raised the gun to her clavicle and angled one eye down the length of the barrel."
"What is left when there is no love? A rope and rock."
"It was as if I'd lost some cosmic game of musical chairs; the song had stopped, I was left standing, and there was simply nothing to be dine about it."
"All things fell into the past but one; and what that was, was love."
"Behind every great hatred is a love story. For I am a man who has known and tasted love. I say “a man” because that is how I know myself. Look at me, and what do you see? Do I not take the form of a man? Do I not feel as you do, suffer as you do, love as you do, mourn as you do? What is the essence of a man, if not these things?"
"Absolution is not the same as understanding."
"City of memories, city of mirrors."
"Below lies the dark core, that great iron ball beneath all things. Its compressed weight is fantastic; it is older than time itself. It is a vestige of the blackness that predates all existence, when a formless universe existed in a state of chaotic un-creation, lacking awareness even of itself."
"All stories end when they have returned to their beginnings."
"What is home but a place where you are truly known?"
"So, at the last, a story."
"Behind every great hatred is a love story."
"It was like leading people to the edge of a cliff, showing them the view, and then shoving them off."
"I like cats as much as the next person, in the right quantity."
"Drinking myself blind seemed like the next logical step."
"You are Entering the Red Zone.Proceed at Own Risk.When in Doubt Run."
"It is an interesting truth that the human body, liberated from its head, is in essence a bag of blood with a built-in straw."