Harry Turtledove Quotes

Still very erect, he saluted his men. Some of them cried out his name. Others let loose with what they still called the Rebel yell. Tears now streaming down his face, Patton waited for the tumult to die down a little. Then he stepped into the ragged ranks of the rest of the POWs. Defeated Confederate soldiers shook his hand and embraced him.

If Earl Eyvind wanted to talk nonsense, he was welcome to, as far as Hamnet was concerned.
If he wanted anyone else to take him seriously when he did…that was another story altogether.

Anxious, he asked, “My dear, how are you?”
“As the good Lord meant me to be,” she answered, to which he found no response. She went on, “Pretty soon I’ll see Him face-to-face, and I intend to have a good long talk with Him about the way things do go on in this here world.”
“Good,” Douglass said. “I’m sure He could have made a much better job of things had He had you to advise Him.”

"I know what the two of you are here for," Vlasov rasped. "You're going to try and talk me into sucking the Americans' cocks." "No, Comrade General, no. Nothing like that," Shteinberg said soothingly. Yes, Comrade General, yes. Just like that, Vladimir Bokov thought fiercely. He wanted to watch Vlasov squirm. Maybe they could have kept the crash from happening if only the miserable bastard had put his ass in gear. "Don't bother buttering me up, zhid," Vlasov said. "Nothing but a waste of time." "However you please... sir." Moisei Shteinberg held his voice under tight control. "My next move, if you keep dicking around with us, is to write to Marshal Beria and let him know how you're obstructing the struggle against the Heydrichite bandits." "You wouldn't dare!" General Vlasov bellowed. "Yes, I would. I've already done it," Shteinberg said. "And if anything happens to me, the letter goes to Moscow anyway. I've taken care of that, too... sir." "Fuck your mother hard!" "Maybe my father did," Shteinberg answered calmly. "But at least I know who he was... sir." Could looks have killed, Yuri Vlasov would have shouted for men to come and drag two corpses out of his office.

Being sure wasn’t the same thing as being right.

“I’ve been thinking,” George Enos said….
Beside him, Carl Sturtevant was panting more than a little. “Probably won’t do you any lasting harm,” he said.

Early summer in Nashville made a good practice ground for hell.

You see?" he said. "You just wanted me to tell you I was wrong." "Well, of course," Anne answered, and poked him in the ribs. "What else does a woman want to hear from a man?" "How about, 'I love you'? How about, 'You're beautiful'?" Potter suggested. "Those are nice, too," she agreed with a smile. "As far as I'm concerned, though, nothing's better than, 'You were right.'

The Mormons habitually dissembled about their plural marriages.

The lad was at an age where he was inclined to believe things would turn out as he wanted for no better reason than that he wanted them to turn out so.

“Why?” he cried, a groan that filled the room.
“Ask God when you come before Him in judgment,” Riario said. “I intend to. He’d best have a good answer, too, or I’ll make Him pay. One day I had a wife I loved, two daughters I couldn’t afford to dowry, and a face I didn’t mind seeing in a mirror. A couple of weeks later…

“I never knew any Sonorans before you. You’re a good fellow. You ever get tired of trying to scratch out a living down where you’re at, you bring your family on up to Alabama. Plenty of good farm country there. You’d live high on the hog.”
“Thanks, amigo, but no thanks.” Rodriguez’s smile was sweet and sad. “I want to go home. I want to talk español, to see my friends and family. And in Sonora, I am a man. In Alabama, I am a damn greaser.” He tapped a brown hand with a brown finger to remind Pinkard of what he meant.
In the trenches, Jeff had long since stopped worrying about their being of different colors. Hip was right, though; it would matter in Alabama.