Louise Penny Quotes

Not a spoon clinked against a mug, not a creamer was popped, peeled and opened, not a breath. It was as though something else had joined them then. As though silence had taken a seat.

As a good rule of thumb, if you have to lie, you might be doing something wrong.

Henri kept everything important in his heart. He mostly kept cookies in his head.

Most people want to be led. But suppose they choose the wrong leader? They end up with the Donner party.

It’s too easy to feed the anger. Too cowardly to stoke the hate. You must look inside yourself and decide who you are and who you want to be. Character is not created in times like these. It’s revealed. This is a trying time. A testing time. Be careful.”
Chapter 14 · Page 122 · Location 2188

How much more courage it took to be kind than to be cruel.

He knew time could heal. But it could also do more damage. A forest fire, spread over time, would consume everything.

Her voice was flat, in a way Myrna recognized from years of listening to people trying to rein in their emotions. To squash them down, flatten, them, and with them their words and their voices. Desperately trying to make the horrific sound mundane.

The reason “belonging” was so potent, so attractive, so much a part of the human yearning, was that it also meant safety, and loyalty. If you were “one of us” you were protected.

"Let every man shovel out his own snow, and the whole city will be passable," said Gamache. Seeing Beauvoir's puzzled expression he added, "Emerson."

"Lake and Palmer?"

"Ralph and Waldo."

Be very, very careful who you let into your life. And learn to make peace with whatever happens. You can't erase the past. It's trapped in there with you. But you can make peace with it. If you don't,' he said, 'you'll be at perpetual war.

Love wants the best for others. Attachment takes hostages.

Life is change. If you aren't growing and evolving you're standing still, and the rest of the world is surging ahead. Most of these people are very immature; they lead still lives, waiting.

Waiting for what?

Waiting for someone to save them. Expecting someone to save them, or at least protect them from the big bad world. The thing is no one else can save them because the problem is theirs, and so is the solution. Only they can get out of it.

Long dead and buried in another town My mother isn’t finished with me yet.

Things sometimes fell apart unexpectedly. It was not necessarily a reflection of how much they were valued.