Louise Penny Quotes

Entitlement was, she knew, a terrible thing. It chained the person to their victimhood. It gobbled up all the air around it. Until the person lived in a vacuum, where nothing good could flourish.

Clara Morrow had painted Ruth as the elderly, forgotten Virgin Mary. Angry, demented, the Ruth in the portrait was full of despair, of bitterness. Of a life left behind, of opportunities squandered, of loss and betrayals real and imagined and created and caused. She clutched at a rough blue shawl with emaciated hands. The shawl had slipped off one bony shoulder and the skin was sagging, like something nailed up and empty.
“And yet the portrait was radiant, filling the room from one tiny point of light. In her eyes. Embittered, mad Ruth stared into the distance, at something very far off, approaching. More imagined than real.
Hope.
Clara had captured the moment despair turned to hope. The moment life began. She’d somehow captured Grace.

And while forgetting the past might condemn people to repeat it, remembering it too vividly condemned them to never leave.

To remain conscious and continent was her new goal.

That was why she was happy. He now knew that happiness and kindness went together. There was not one without the other.

Hope offered, then denied. A particular cruelty.

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

Peter swept aside Yogi Tea and Harmony Herbal Blend, though he hesitated a second over the chamomile. .... But no. Violent death demanded Earl Grey.

In winter the very ground seemed to reach up and grab the elderly, yanking them to earth as though hungry for them.

I often think we should have tattooed on the back of whatever hand we use to shoot or write, 'I might be wrong.

Eventually he'd let the answering machine take over and had hidden in his studio. Where he's hidden all his life. From the monster.

He could feel itin their bedroom now. He could feel its tail swishing by him. Feel its hot, fetid breath.

All his life he knew if he was quiet enough, small enough, it wouldnn't see him. If he didn't make a fuss, didn't speak up, it wouldn't hear him, wouldn't hurt him. If he was beyond criticism and hid his cruelty with a smile and good deeds, it wouldn't devour him.

By now he realized there was no hiding. It would always be there, and always find him.

He was the monster.

Love and worry. They went hand in hand. Fellow travelers.

Few things are better in the world than a room full of librarians. I consider them literary heroes. The keepers and defenders of the written word.

They waited for life to happen to them. They waited for someone to save them. Or heal them. They did nothing for themselves.

Myrna could spend happy hours browsing bookcases. She felt if she could just get a good look at a person’s bookcase and their grocery cart, she’d pretty much know who they were.