Quotes from Jim Butcher

Better the enemy you know than the enemy you don't.

The Shroud was old, and regarded as special, and people believed in it. That could be enough to give it a kind of power, all by itself.

How about it, wizard? Cop? Maybe you've got stones enough to take it when I threaten you. I can admire that.

Peace cannot be bought, Aleron," he murmured to LaFortier. "History teaches that lesson. I learned it. You should have, too." LaFortier

I was staring into a mirror, and I didn't like what I saw there.

I held my hand up, frowning. Wait a minute. Where did you say this thing was stolen from? The Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist. Father Vincent said. In Northern Italy. I said. He nodded. In Turin, to be exact. He nodded again, his expression reserved. Someone stole the freaking Shroud of Turin ? I demanded. Yes. I settled back in the chair, looking down at the photos again. This changed things. This changed things a lot.

Death should be a learning experience, after all, or what's the point?

Later. Bad habit to get into," Thomas said. "Life's too short.

We're stunning—and we need to be, if we're to make a good impression and accomplish our goals. It's vain, it's stupid, and it's shallow, but that makes it no less true.

Nothing is truly safe in this world—and that being the case, why worry about threats that have not yet appeared? Far wiser to make what preparations one could, face trouble as it arose, and be happy in the meantime.

And I'm the tool, I muttered. Then I thought about it, sighed, and shook my head. One day, I told myself, one brave and magnificent day, I will actually be cool.

A man's magic demonstrates what sort of person he is, what is held most deeply inside of him. There is no truer gauge of a man's character than the way in which he employs his strength, his power.

My mouth kept running without checking in with my brain. My heart maybe, but not my brain.

It doesn't take much power to hurt someone, she said. It's far easier than healing the damage.

Some things should hurt. Some things should leave you with scars. Some things should haunt your nightmares. Some things should be burned into memory.

Then why, Michael asked are you expecting perfection out of yourself? Do you really think you're that much better than the rest of us? That your powers make you a higher quality of human being? That your knowledge places you on a higher plane than everyone else on this world?

I snagged a golden paper crown from one of the bags, and idly joined it into a circle and put it on my head. Susan blinked at me and let out a brief laugh. 'I am' I intoned with an imperious narrowing of my eyes, 'the burger king.

A good man, almost by definition, would seriously question any decisions he made that led to such terrible consequences for others. Especially if those others trusted him.

One grip shy of a steering column? Grimm suggested. Ten degrees short of a compass? Aviating without goggles?

Here's something else I bet you didn't know about Tyrannosaurs: they don't corner well.

Planet Earth isn't a fair place. It's unfair in a broad variety of different ways, some worse than others, but it isn't fair. Not for anybody. And that's pretty much the fairest thing about it.

It's okay to hurt. It's not okay to fail the people who rely on me. That was my point of balance.

I have a monster under my bed, and it's Mouse.

and several bulging bookshelves which I really will organize one day.