Quotes from Joe Abercrombie

Wine can keep a happy man happy, on occasion. A sad one it always makes worse.

He was developing a sneaking feeling he had found his way onto the wrong side. Again. But it's not always easy to tell when you're picking. Perhaps, as Kahdia once told him, you are on the wrong side as soon as you pick one.

Blood gets you nothing but more blood. It follows me now, always, like my shadow, and like my shadow I can never be free of it. I should never be free of it. I've earned it. I've deserved it. I've sought it out. Such is my punishment.

It always catches people by surprise, the moment of their death, even when they should see it coming. They always think they're special, somehow expect a reprieve. But no one's special.

Who asked your opinion?' 'A man who doesn't want opinions should keep his own mouth shut.

Help with strange problems comes from strange people.

Nothing is ever fixed. From the moment it is born, from the moment it is built, everything is always dying, decaying, drifting into chaos.

But you know what they say - old milk turns sour but old scores just get sweeter.

Always the ones quickest to insults got the thinnest skin, for some reason.

Cleverness is no guarantee of sensible behavior.

He blamed every fucker available excepting, of course, the one who was actually to blame, the one sitting in his saddle and getting colder, hungrier, and more lost with every unpleasant moment. 'Shit!' he roared at nothing.

When the best you can get from your wife's father is that he won't help to kill you, it doesn't take a clever man to see you're in shit to your chin.

Logen pulled the knife out of his boot and rammed the blade into the side of the giant's neck. He looked surprised, for just a moment, then blood dribbled from his mouth and down his chin. He let go of Logen's shirt, stumbled back, spun slowly round, bounced off one of the stones and crashed on his face. Seemed that Logen's father had been right. You can never have too many knives.

Walk in God's footsteps, Ferro Maljinn." "Huh. They have no God here." "Say rather that they have many." "Many?" "Had you not noticed? Here, each man worships himself.

As far as I'm concerned you can fuck whomever you please, though my general observation has been that, as far as the reputations of young women are concerned, the less fucking the better. The reverse is true for young men of course. Hardly fair, but then life is unfair in so many ways, this one hardly seems worth commenting on.

Give Yarvi the knife since he has just one hand to hold it. One hand, perhaps, but the blood of kings in his veins!" "It's keeping it there that worries me," said Yarvi under his breath.

Either you are a part of my future, or a relic of the past.

The people far prefer a leader who appears great, to one who is.

I was too busy wallowing in pain and bitterness. Too busy being tragic.

Tell your father he must come himself. I do not waste my time on fools and younger sons. I am old fashioned in this. I like to talk to the horse's head, not the horse's arse.

Shock and surprise, my little beauties, and quickness to strike, and lack of pity. These are the things that make a killer.

Enough pain makes a coward of anyone.

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.

Conscience can be painful but so can the cock-rot. A grown-up should suffer his afflictions privately and not allow them to become an inconvenience for friends and colleagues.' - The Magnificent Nicomo Cosca