Quotes from John Sandford

If something did happen to Bowden, how would that affect your chances?" Lucas asked. "What a rotten, cynical question to ask. I'm proud of you," Henderson said.

Fell finally led Lucas into a clothing store that apparently hadn't changed either stock or customers since '69. Every male customer other than Lucas was bearded, and three of the four women customers wore tie-dye. Lucas bought an ill-fitting leather porkpie hat. In the mirror, he looked like a hippie designer's idea of an Amazon explorer.

Dannon brought the .22 up and shot him in the temple. Carver's head bounced off the side window and Dannon shot him again, the .22 shots deafening inside the truck, but hardly audible outside. Carver slumped, his face not even looking surprised.

JENKINS AND VIRGIL walked back up the valley to the Ruff house, and found Muddy inside, tootling on a black electric guitar, a complex

pleasant-enough place, as cemeteries went, and if somebody had told him that he'd be buried there, after a life of, say, a hundred forty years and much more sex and barbecue, he would have been content with the prospect.

JAMES QATAR WAS an art history professor and a writer, a womanizer and genial pervert and pipe smoker, a thief and a laughing man and a killer. He thought of himself as sensitive and engaged, and tried to live up to that image.

THIS WOULD BE the first tricky part, they knew. They'd come in on the south side of the fairgrounds, between the swine and sheep barns. There would be cops all over the place—though fewer at night—and they wanted to get to the machinery grounds, where there were always a number of pickups parked. While they had the truck pass, it wouldn't stand a real check. If somebody called in the pass number, it'd show up as lost or stolen.

Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.

The high Wisconsin bluffs on the St. Croix are such a dark green that in bright afternoon sunlight, they seem almost black.

but up in the northwest, have been talking to a hard-right

Motherfucker who'd lock a live dog down in the basement," Zimmer said. "I don't think Glen would do that if he decided to kill himself. He'd at least let the dog outside. If Glen was murdered . . . Well, I can understand shooting somebody, but why would you do that to a dog?

Give me the goddamn names, Grace," Lucas said. "C'mon. Please. Talk to me. Save yourself." "Fuck you." — FORD CAME BACK, looked at Lucas, asked, "Get a name?" "Not unless it's 'Fuck you,'" Lucas said.

a few times, and then pushed the screen door open. "Let's go," Stern said. As they crossed the porch

Heart of Darkness

The advanced interstellar culture operates on a barter system. Never saw that one coming.

Mr. Hogan is not tall himself, at five feet ten inches

On the way out to Lawrence's, he thought about Palmer's wild reaction. Was there a little fear there? Hard to tell, with all the other possibilities—anger, bigotry, psychosis.

the truck. Yael was waiting at the front bumper, and as he came up to her, a sheriff's patrol car turned off the road and onto the track and accelerated toward them. Virgil said to Yael, "He's been shot, but he'll live. For the time being, anyway. He says he doesn't know anything

I don't watch porn," Cooper snapped. Loma shrugged. "Okay, it's a free country." Lucas glanced at Virgil, who was glancing at him: Virgil lifted an eyebrow and Lucas nodded. They agreed. Cooper watched porn, and probably, Lucas thought, girl on girl. Shouldn't lie about it when you have professional lie detectors listening in.

The purpose of depots like this one is to allow contact between alien species without direct contact. Early on, direct contacts were tried many times, by many different species, in many different ways. It almost always went badly. With few exceptions, alien species are too different from each other to allow constructive interaction. At best the efforts were extremely discomforting to one or both of the contactees. At worst, one or both found the other genuinely repugnant in some way.

After she'd blocked the peephole, she went to her laptop and did a Google search on peephole intrusions—and learned that women were not only watched, but had actually been filmed through the peephole as they undressed inside their locked rooms. Yet another reason, Letty thought, that all women should be issued guns at birth.

He could have used the cash. The new light topcoats for the coming season were hip-length, and he'd seen the perfect example at Neiman Marcus: six hundred fifty dollars, on sale, with a wool lining.

THE BACK DOOR, what was left of it, scraped open again, and they could hear boot steps on the stoop, and Lucas said, "This is it, Grace. Who's going after Bowden? Give me something that'll give you a break." She shook her head. "Fuck you.

bar. Lucas pointed at a stool and said, "Beer?