1
You ever have the feeling you were in the wrong place? That if you could just get over the next hill, cross the next river, look down into the next valley, it'd all..fit. Be right."" All my life, more of less"“ All your life spent getting ready for the next thing. I climbed a lot of hills now. I crossed a lot of rivers. Crossed the sea even, left everything I knew and came to Styria. But there I was, waiting for me at the docks when I got off the boat, same man, same life. Next valley ain’t no different from this one. No better anyway. Reckon I’ve learned … just to stick in the place I’m at. Just to be the man I am. .Joe Abercrombie
2
Every war carries within it the seeds of the next.Joe Abercrombie
3
The world is all change, my friend. We all would like to go back, but the past is done. We must look forwards. We must change ourselves, however painful it may be, or be left behind.Joe Abercrombie
4
One cannot grow without pain. One cannot improve without it. Suffering drives us to achieve great things.Joe Abercrombie
5
Enough pain makes a coward of anyone.Joe Abercrombie
6
Shivers heaved out a sigh. “Just trying to make tomorrow that bit better than today is all. I’m one of those … you’ve got a word for it, don’t you?”“ Idiots?” He looked sideways at her. “It was a different one I had in mind.”“ Optimists.”“ That’s the one. I’m an optimist.”“ How’s it working out for you?”“ Not great, but I keep hoping.”“ That’s optimists. You bastards never learn.Joe Abercrombie
7
A set of huge marble busts stared smugly down from on high: great merchants and financiers of Styrian history, by the look of them. Criminals made heroes by colossal success.Joe Abercrombie
8
Are you entirely sure of that knot?' asked Morveer. 'There is no place in the plan for a lengthy drop'.' Twenty-eight strides', said Friendly.'What?''The drop'. A brief pause, 'That is not helpful'.Joe Abercrombie
9
The memories of our glories fade, and rot away into half-arsed anecdotes, thin and unconvincing as some other bastard's lies. The failures, the disappointments, the regrets, they stay raw as the moments they happened.Joe Abercrombie
10
Men are brittle, I reckon. They don't bend into new shapes. They get broken into them. Crushed into them.Joe Abercrombie
11
Monza never had understood why getting out a tit or two made for a better painting. But painters seemed to think it did, so tits is what you got.Joe Abercrombie
12
Memories sharp enough to cut himself on - the smells, the sounds, the feel of the air on his skin, the desperate hope and mad anger.Joe Abercrombie
13
It's a crime, when you think about how little time we get, that a man should ever be bored. When you are lying on your death bead, I expect you regret those weeks wasted more than your worst mistakes.Joe Abercrombie
14
A man can forgive all manner of faults in beautiful women that in ugly men he find entirely beyond sufferanceJoe Abercrombie
15
I apologise, your Highness. Murder can be a painful business.Joe Abercrombie
16
Bravery is the dead man’s virtue.Joe Abercrombie
17
It was what you gave out that made a man, not what you got back.Joe Abercrombie
18
Have a smile for breakfast, you'll be shitting joy by lunch.Joe Abercrombie
19
Things aren't what they used to be' is the rallying cry of small minds. When men say things used to be better, they invariably mean they were better for them, because they were young, and had all their hopes intact. The world is bound to look a darker place as you slide into the grave.Joe Abercrombie
20
So he was handsome. That fact did nothing to soften her feelings toward the walking interference she studied across the room.Eliza Lloyd
21
Mercy and cowardice are the same, " she snapped out. "But you want their land, not their lives, no? Dead men can't obey.Joe Abercrombie
22
To have a good enemy, choose a friend: he knows where to strike.Joe Abercrombie
23
The sunrise was the colour of bad blood. It leaked out of the east and stained the dark sky red, marked the scraps of the cloud with stolen gold. Underneath it the road twisted up the mountainside towards the fortress of Fontezarmo - a cluster of sharp towers, ash-black again the wounded heavens. The sunrise was red, black and gold. The colours of their profession.Joe Abercrombie
24
I've made peace with myself. Good for you. That's the hardest war of all to win. Didn't say I won. Just stopped fighting.Joe Abercrombie
25
You look especially beautiful this morning, Monza."That brought a smile to the corner of her mouth. The corner he couldn't see. "Well. Facts are facts.Joe Abercrombie
26
Some men laugh easily. It makes them winning dinner companions.Joe Abercrombie