Quotes from Richard K. Morgan

Against the distant roar of the maelstrom I heard it. The hurrying strop of rotor blades on the fabric of the night.

À adorer l'incertitude.

Comme Bancroft, MacIntyre avait été un homme de pouvoir et, comme tous les hommes de pouvoir, quand il parlait de prix, vous pouviez être sûr d'une chose : C'était quelqu'un d'autre qui payait.

There was finely toned muscle in her legs, and a substantial biceps stood out when she lifted her arms. Exuberant breasts strained the fabric of the leotard. I wondered if the body was hers.

I already have a doctorate in conflict investment. I don't really need the gifted-amateur reading list.

It's no time here. I am time here. I am all the time you need.

With a game, you're only one part of a team, and what emerges at launch is very much the culmination of the whole team's efforts. You can be proud of playing your part, but it doesn't ever belong to you.

Society is, always has been and always will be a structure for the exploitation and oppression of the majority through systems of political force dictated by an élite, enforced by thugs, uniformed or not, and upheld by a willful ignorance and stupidity on the part of the very majority whom the system oppresses.

A preoccupation with the next world clearly shows an inability to cope credibly with this one.

The human eye is a wonderful device. With a little effort, it can fail to see even the most glaring injustice.

If they asked how I died tell them: Still angry.

Culture is like a smog. To live within it, you must breathe some of it in and, inevitably, be contaminated.

The way I see it, anyone who's proud of their country is either a thug or just hasn't read enough history yet.

We all get our dreams stamped on from time to time, right? And if it didn't hurt, what kind of second-rate dreams would they be?

A weapon is a tool," she repeated, a little breathlessly. "A tool for killing and destroying. And there will be times when, as an Envoy, you must kill and destroy. Then you will choose and equip yourself with the tools that you need. But remember the weakness of weapons. They are an extension--you are the killer and destroyer. You are whole, with or without them.

There are some arenas so corrupt that the only clean acts possible are nihilistic.

it's just business, it's politics, it's the way of the world, it's a tough life and that it's nothing personal. Well, fuck them. Make it personal.

You'll always have morons like that, swallowing belief patterns whole so they don't have to think for themselves.

There should have been a better farewell. But in the end, there never is. And we take what meagre scraps we can find.

Reality is so flexible these days, it's hard to tell who's disconnected from it and who isn't. You might even say it's a pointless distinction.

Pull on the new flesh like borrowed gloves and burn your fingers once again.

The past is relevant only as data.

You live that long, things start happening to you. You get too impressed with yourself. Ends up, you think you're God. Suddenly the little people, thirty, maybe forty years old, well, they don't really matter anymore. You've seen whole societies rise and fall, and you start to feel you're standing outside it all, and none of it really matters to you. And maybe you'll start snuffing those little people, just like picking daisies, if they get under your feet.

I lay still for a while, picking up the scattered garments of my mind and trying to assemble some kind of reasonable outfit from them.