Louise Penny Quotes

Attachment masquerades as Love, Pity as Compassion and Indifference as Equanimity.

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

As the boys screamed and hauled off handfuls of mulch, Olivier had slowly, deliberately, gently taken Gabri’s hand and held it before gracefully lifting it to his lips. The boys had watched, momentarily stunned, as Olivier had kissed Gabri’s manure-stained hand with his manure-stained lips. The boys had seemed petrified by this act of love and defiance. But just for a moment. Their hatred triumphed and soon their attack had re-doubled.

Now here's a good one:
you're lying on your deathbed.
You have one hour to live.
Who is it, exactly, you have needed
all these years to forgive?

Turmoil shook loose all sorts of unpleasant truths. But it took peace to examine them.

…the pain of neuralgia…she knew what they thought. That she was cold. Couldn't feel. But in fact she felt too much. Too deeply.

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.

I think many people love their problems. Gives them all sorts of excuses for not growing up and getting on with life.

Most of us are great with change, as long as it was our idea.

Don't mistake dramatics for a conscience.

Non. He said, ‘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.

Every year the hunters shot cows and horses and family pets and each other. And unbelievably, they sometimes shot themselves, perhaps in a psychotic episode where they mistook themselves for dinner

They were cunning,deceitful,arrogant and nearly incomprehensible,especially the Anglos. They were dangerous because they hid their thoughts,hid their feelings behind a smiling face. Who could tell what was really going on in their heads? They said one thing and thought another. Who knew what rancid thing lived ,curled up,in the space between words and thoughts.

We don't just sing; we are the song.

told him the four sentences that lead to wisdom. He’d said them only once, never repeating them. But once had been enough for Gamache. I’m sorry. I was wrong. I need help. I don’t know.