Quotes from Robert B. Parker

I write five pages a day. If you would read five pages a day, we'd stay right even.

I didn't have to say it. I just had to write it. It was painful enough.

They give me the money, I give them the book. Having input into the adaptation would be kind of like selling a house and coming back three years later and saying, 'Paint it this color!'

Yeah. Floyd is his batman.

Well, you give me too much credit for foresight and planning. I haven't got a clue what the hell I'm doing.

Jesus Christ," she said. "You are just like him, a master of the fucking oblique answer.

The thing about monsters is, you want to kill them until you meet them, and when you meet them they don't seem monstrous, and killing them begins to seem unkind.

What if you could be young again and were able to undo the things that were done that made you into the person you would later become. But then who would you be.

And so forth and so on.

Mary sat, quiet and attentive and blank. It wasn't like talking to a dumb seventh-grader, it was like talking to a pancake.

There was nearly an inch of snow accumulated and Washington was rapidly sinking into hysteria.

Got nothing to do with us," I said. "I'm working on a case. You're my trusty sidekick." "Long as I don't have to call you Kemo Sabe." "Ever wonder what that meant?" I said. "I always thought it meant Paleface Motherfucker," Hawk said. "That's probably it," I said.

I think you've never quite altogether forgiven yourself for that woman in Los Angeles all that time ago." "Candy Sloan," I said. Susan nodded. "Only time I ever cheated on you," I said. "Makes it that much worse, doesn't it?" Susan said. "I'm not sure it makes any difference," I said. Susan smiled the smile she used when she knew I was wrong but planned to let me get away with it.

It was a bright day, but cold, and the whores had emerged, working the Combat Zone, looking cold and bizarre in their miniskirts, boots, and blond wigs. Being seductive at twenty degrees was heavy going, I thought. Being horny at twenty degrees wasn't all that easy either.

I NEVER SAW Susan without feeling a small but discernible thrill. The thrill was mixed with a feeling of gratitude that she was with me, and a feeling of pride that she was with me, and a feeling of arrogance that she was fortunate to be with me. But mostly it was just a quick pulse along the ganglia which, if it were audible, would sound a little like woof.

We'll let the B and E slide," Quirk said. "But corpses keep showing up in your area, we might cite you for littering.

I don't think Hawk or I are operating on emotional whim. It's just the way we experience things sometimes needs to get translated sort of promptly into a, ah, course of action. So we have tended to bypass the meditative circuit." "Wow," Hawk said.

The best moments in my life," I said, "have come because I loved somebody." "Yeah," he said. "And the worst," I said.

There is excitement in a new kiss, but there is a quality of memory and intimacy in kissing someone you've kissed often before. I

But like they say at the Pentagon, you have to plan for the enemy's capacity, not his intentions.

I put my arms around her and closed my eyes and put my cheek against the top of her head and stood for a long time without speaking while my soul melted into her. I knew we weren't the same person. I knew that it was good that we weren't. I knew separateness made love possible. But there were moments, like this one, of crystalline stillness, when it felt as if we really could merge like two oceans at the bottom of the world.

I try to be honorable. I know that's embarrassing to hear. It's embarrassing to say. But I believe most of the nonsense that Thoreau was preaching. And I have spent a long time working on getting myself to where I could do it. Where I could live life largely on my own terms.

Can you analyze our relationship in the light of Silvermanian pragmatism?" I said. "I love you because I find it compelling to be loved so entirely. You love me because as long as you do you can believe in romantic love.

The [living] room was as intimate as an operating room but not as welcoming.