Louise Penny Quotes

Grief was dagger-shaped and sharp and pointed inward. It was made of fresh loss and old sorrow. Rendered and forged and sometimes polished. Irene Finney had taken her daughter’s death and to that sorrow she’d added a long life of entitlement and disappointment, of privilege and pride. And the dagger she’d fashioned was taking a brief break from slashing her insides, and was now pointed outward.

When someone stabs you it's not your fault that you feel pain.

The leaves had fallen from the trees and lay crisp and crackling beneath his feet. Picking one up he marveled, not for the first time, at the perfection of nature where leaves were most beautiful at the very end of their lives.

I went through a period in my life when I had no friends, when the phone never rang, when I thought I would die from loneliness. I know that the real blessing here isn't that I have a book published, but that I have so many people to thank.

Do you know what I’ve learned, after three decades of death?” Gamache asked, leaning toward the agent and lowering his voice. Despite himself, the agent leaned forward. “I’ve learned how precious life is.

What I was going to say is that my mentor had this theory that our lives are like an aboriginal longhouse. Just one huge room.” He swept one arm out to illustrate scope. “He said that if we thought we could compartmentalize things, we were deluding ourselves. Everyone we meet, every word we speak, every action taken or not taken lives in our longhouse. With us. Always. Never to be expelled or locked away.

When senior officers start shooting each other, it’s time to leave,” said Gamache. “I’m sure it’s somewhere in the regulations.

We see it when bullies are in charge. It becomes part of the culture of an institution, a family, an ethnic group, a country. It becomes not just acceptable, but expected. Applauded even.

The lines of his face were the longitude and latitude of his life.

It's a shame that creativity and sloth look exactly the same.

In Beauvoir's experience Darwin was way wrong. The fittest didn't survive, they were killed by the idiocy of their neighbors, who continued to bumble along oblivious.

The night is a strawberry.

Where there is love, there is courage
Where there is courage, there is peace
Where there is peace, there is God
And when you have God, you have everything.

Life is choice. All day, everyday. Who we talk to, where we sit, what we say, how we say it. And our lives become defined by our choices. It's as simple and as complex as that. And as powerful. so when I'm observing that's what I'm watching for. The choices people make

There seems such a fine line between falling into place and falling apart.