Quotes from John Varley

Maybe I'm crazy," she said, "but I wonder if this is where the thing that ate us gets its water?" "Could be. I'm not diving in to find out.

The hard, dark walls threw her song back until the black hub rang with her defiant music.

It was odd, she thought that she had seen all the male crew members naked, but had to come to Themis to see Gaby. What a strange creature she was with no hair.

Mighty as Gaea was, she had seen better days.

Showmanship, that's what it was. What kind of a God would need it?

Gaea was short and squat, built like a barrel. Her skin was weathered and brown. She had a nose like a potato. But there were laugh lines around the corners of her eyes and her sensuous mouth.

Given the chance, she would take adventure to security, if security meant building a hut from sticks and settling down to a diet of raw meat and fruit. She would be crazy in a month.

If you have to ask that question, you wouldn't understand the answer.

There was no telling what dangers that land concealed, but it seemed to call to her.

Was she supposed to be impressed? If waste was impressive, she was overwhelmed.

I pledge my shade to the eternal torment of the one called Gaea!

If you can pretend well enough to fool someone else, you might even fool yourself.

In a near anarchy, the only law is to maintain order. My

She took a deep breath, straightened her shoulders, and began to sing.

She shrugged. "Some of it used to cause problems, like cancer. Most of it's not very nutritious. They watched for carcinogens, but that's because a consumer with cancer eats less. As for nutrition, the more air the better. My rule of thumb is if they have to flog the stuff on television it has to be bad.

Her sense of pitch was near-perfect, and it was critical to the blimp speech.

There are carnivores, but not many. Symbiosis is the basic fact of life. That, and worship. Whistletop says all of the higher life forms owe allegiance to a godhead, and the seat of divinity is in the hub. I've been thinking of a goddess that rules the whole circle of the land. I call her Gaia, for the Greek mother.

How could she let him go, with all that information in his head? It was spotty, and they had no way of knowing how much of it was true, but it was all they had.

She had never been a gloomy person. There had been some good times aboard Ringmaster, but little out-and-out fun.

It was terrible to have that much nervous energy and nothing to do with it.

I call him Whistletop." "You call him Whistletop," Cirocco repeated numbly. "That's right. He's a blimp." "A blimp.

Sooner or later everybody demands that I be what they want me to be, and now you're doing it.

He was smiling at the blimp, happier than Cirocco had ever seen him.

Gaby shouldn't have called this place Themis. Call it Gaia.