A. Lee Martinez Quotes & Sayings

I believe it was the great ogre philosopher Gary who observed that complexity is, generally speaking, an illusion of conscious desire. All things exist in as simple a form as necessity dictates. When a thing is labeled 'complex,' that's just a roundabout way of saying you're not observant enough to understand it. — A. Lee Martinez

Vance shook his head. "Philly, I love you, buddy. I do. But you're not my type."
"I'm not?"
"What? Are you insulted?"
Philip was pondering that when the front door jingled. — A. Lee Martinez

Life isn't about the things you can't have... It is about those blessings you do find along the way. — A. Lee Martinez

Death should take more care with his paperwork. — A. Lee Martinez

I'm sorry, Mr. Whiteleaf. I'm not going to let a monster eat me for minimum wage. — A. Lee Martinez

Legends are always better from afar. — A. Lee Martinez

All coincidences are Odd. That's what makes them coincidences. — A. Lee Martinez

I'll take hope over hopelessness everyday. — A. Lee Martinez

Destiny was a hope found in the hearts of desperate men. But sometimes, if they believed strongly enough, desperate men could do great things. — A. Lee Martinez

Humans ... You want a nice warm hug from a cold, indifferent universe. — A. Lee Martinez

I wanted to glance one last time over my shoulder, but there was no reason to. Looking behind would only show me the things I'd seen, and everything of importance I could always see, — A. Lee Martinez

Heroes are carried on the backs of a thousand forgotten faces. — A. Lee Martinez

Without limitations, how does one find satisfaction? — A. Lee Martinez

The ninth circle was where Hell did its accountancy. The demons within were ruthlessly efficient. All they cared about were profit and cost-effectiveness. Everything was a debit or credit, a gain or a loss. Their ultimate goal was to reduce the universe to a calculation, a final heartless equation in which every soul, living and dead, divine and damned, would serve in the Glorious Ultimate Dividend. — A. Lee Martinez

Destroy knowledge?" I said. "The only point of existence, if there is one at all, is in the accumulation of the collective intelligence of the sentient beings of the universe."
"Even dangerous intelligence?"
"Intelligence is neutral. Application is everything."
She sighed. "Says the evil genius."
"Evil is a relative term. — A. Lee Martinez

There are areas of New England, plenty of them, with quaintness to spare, with color-changing leaves and folksy folks full of folksy homespun wisdom accompanied by folksy accents — A. Lee Martinez

Do these robots looked armed? And I was talking to the dinosaur. Were you worried he would discuss me to death? — A. Lee Martinez

Quiet fell upon the pickup and lasted for a little over nineteen minutes.
Is that why you hang around with him?", Loretta asked. "Cuz he saved your life?"
"Sort'a. I know Earl isn't always easy to get along with. Fact is, he can be a real pain the ass more often than not, but after you spend enough time with him, and you learn to ignore his personality, he's a pretty decent guy."
"If you say so. — A. Lee Martinez

A place that proves if you get enough talented people in a room, one or two are bound to offer some helpful advice. Kind if like monkeys with typewriters. — A. Lee Martinez

She wore a pleated skirt, a white cotton blouse, and simple black shoes with knee high stockings. At the arc of each step, the skirt would rise to expose a few inches of her taut thighs. Neither Earl nor Duke could recall what Chad was wearing. — A. Lee Martinez

Nessy had never believed that fear and respect were the same thing. Nor did she believe that the castle's manners were beyond redemption, for although her accursed home was mostly bad it was at least a little bit good. She hoped it would be good enough. — A. Lee Martinez

Are you a monster?" she asked. Helen smiled. "No, sweetie. I'm just an Enchanted American. — A. Lee Martinez

It's better to think the best of everyone and be wrong than assume the worst and be right. — A. Lee Martinez

The wisest man knows he know nothing. — A. Lee Martinez

Mortal life is too short to be worried all the time. — A. Lee Martinez

Music has always been the greatest expression of mortal philosophy," continued Lucky. "The path to enlightenment is found in the lyrics of Spinal Tap. — A. Lee Martinez

A bot had to find his own way, and I'd figured out that functioning for function's sake was pointless." - Mack Megaton — A. Lee Martinez

We all save ourselves child, even if we are fortunate enough to have help along the way. — A. Lee Martinez

Duke tossed them over the roof. Earl was about to ask Duke to sit in back when he did so without prompting. — A. Lee Martinez

In the middle of nowhere, along a quiet stretch of road, the diner dreamt of the hungry dead. And of two men. — A. Lee Martinez

The revelation that there was nothing "special" about humanity didn't shock her. Not specifically. She'd always been cynical about that sort of thing. The idea that reality was all too big to even quantify in any meaningful way didn't disturb her much either. Except, deep down, she'd assumed there was some inherent logic at work. Like ricocheting molecules congealing into planets and stars, dogs and cats. At least the made sense, even if it wasn't very comforting. At least it put things in neat little boxes with neat little labels that she didn't always understand but could rely on in terms of familiarity. — A. Lee Martinez

Danger was a part of questing. Perhaps some quests were dull and safe affairs. Go to the store. Pick up some eggs. Return henceforth with said eggs and thou shalt be rewarded with the sacred omelet of justice.
Nobody wrote legends about that type of quest. — A. Lee Martinez

It was one thing to hide away from the world. It was quite another to discover the world didn't miss you when you were gone. — A. Lee Martinez

We Venusians are sturdier than that. One can't even become part of the Protectorate until we've survived, naked and unarmed, in the harshest jungles of Venus. Only after a warrior crawls into civilization wearing the pelt of the fearsome screeching five-horned fiend do they pass the test. — A. Lee Martinez

We have to destroy the radioactive brain of Madame Curie. — A. Lee Martinez

Ned passed the next few minutes quietly not dying in his office, and was pleased with how well it was going. He'd stayed alive longer, but now that he was concentrating on it, it felt more like an accomplishment. — A. Lee Martinez

The universe was filled with secrets, and he understood now that one of the biggest was that no one needed to know them all. — A. Lee Martinez

Being a good person is more than just not being a bad person. — A. Lee Martinez

We all carry many selves, but in the end, these are just phantoms of possibility, nothing more than ghosts of broken destinies. — A. Lee Martinez

To worry is to acknowledge that the world is unpredictable, and there is power in understanding one's own powerlessness at times. But too often worry takes on life of its own. Men are quite prone to this. They'll plague themselves with so many 'what if's and 'if only's that they soon forget to ponder the true possibilities before them. Which inevitably lead to poor decisions. Whatever happens will happen. Sometimes we have say over the future. Sometimes we don't. Either way, worrying alone never accomplishes anything. — A. Lee Martinez

When you cross over into the weird stuff, there's no going back. Hector has a theory on it. Calls it the law of 'Anomalous Phenomena Attraction.' He explained it to me once. Didn't really pay attention, but it boils down to 'weird shit pulls in more weird shit. — A. Lee Martinez

I stand corrected. Yours is a far superior arbitrary system of governance. — A. Lee Martinez

Your mistake, indeed the mistake of your inherently finite senses, is to view the universe as an extension of yourself. You expect that, like you, it should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. but what you fail to understand is that everything you consider to be you, except for that rather silly imaginary part you call consciousness, is merely bits and pieces borrowed from the universe, and to the universe it will all return. You had no beginning, and you will have no ending. Everything that is you has always been and will always be. — A. Lee Martinez

Reality is like a fruitcake; pretty enough to look at but with all sorts of nasty things lurking just beneath the surface. — A. Lee Martinez

Dreams are rarely founded on truth. — A. Lee Martinez

To quote a great sage ... answer unclear, try again later. — A. Lee Martinez

Because life is complicated and difficult. Anyone who says otherwise hasn't truly lived. — A. Lee Martinez

He gives me the hairy eyeball, and asks me to help him find his pancreas. — A. Lee Martinez

Vance took the news of their "big-city fellows" status better than Philip. Probably because it turned out that he was actually gay.
"You're what?"
"Well, I'm not entirely sure," said Vance, "but I'd say it's seventy-thirty for it."
"But I've seen you with women."
"That would be the thirty part of the equation," said Vance as he sipped his coffee.
"Oh my God. That's why you agreed to do this with me. You think I'm gay, too!"
Vance chuckled. "Dude you're not gay."
"I know I'm not, but do you know I'm not?"
"I'd say ninety-two-eight on the straight side," said Vance.
"How the hell-"
"They've made some terrific advances in gaydar, dude. — A. Lee Martinez

Those who write are writers. Those who wait are waiters. — A. Lee Martinez

Rockwood didn't have a movie theater or an IHOP or a strip mall. But it did have two churches, a ramshackle bar, and last (but certainly not least) Wacky Willie's Deluxe Goofy Golf, a barren landscape of wilted ferns and plastic flamingos with peeling paint. Wacky Willie had added the 'Deluxe' when finally ridding the thirteenth hole windmill of a stubborn family of bats after a great and terrible struggle that would forever be known as 'The Fearsome Bat War of Rockwood County' by Willie, but was usually referred to as 'That Time Willie Had to Get Rabies Shots' by everyone else. — A. Lee Martinez

She stopped shrieking after a moment. It wasn't the crazy looks she drew from the other pedestrians that made her stop. And her damaged sanity hadn't managed to repair itself. She'd left something behind in that apartment. Something she'd always taken for granted. Faith in a rational world. It was like a tiny cog had been removed from her brain, and all the gears were still working, but a slight wobble was slowly and inevitably stripping the teeth until one day, without warning the Rube Goldberg device that was her mind would fall apart with a loud SPROING. — A. Lee Martinez

Most magic wasn't even magic. It just was. — A. Lee Martinez

The fate of the universe didn't rest in the hands of the giants. It could be found in the littlest things. Anything done well was a worthy accomplishment, whether it be unwrapping arcane secrets or sweeping halls, raising kingdoms from the ocean or washing dishes. All tasks, great or small, were of equal importance in the end. Without peasants, there could be no kings. Without soldiers, there was no army. — A. Lee Martinez

I emitted an ultrasonic signal. The beast climbed off her and scampered to my side. "Good girl, Snarg." I patted her between the antennae, and she squeaked. Zala stood. "By the hidden moon, what is that?" "My pet ultrapede." "I wouldn't expect you to have a pet." "Snarg was a gift of the ambassador of the Undersphere. She's the fiercest ultrapede ever bred for the royal family. How could I turn down a gift like that? — A. Lee Martinez

A sixth sense warned her that she was striking a Faustian bargain. Odd, since she wasn't sure what a Faustian bargain was. But it was something not to be taken lightly. She knew that. — A. Lee Martinez

I want to explore what it means to be human, but not just the most extreme elements of humanity. The quiet moments. The times when the world isn't exploding, but we're still trying to determine who we are and how can we make this thing called life work. And I want to do it while writing about space squids and moon-eating monster gods. — A. Lee Martinez

Relations between Terra and Luna had been strained since the Lunans had eaten Neil Armstrong in 1960. — A. Lee Martinez

Terrible errors are rarely made all at once. Usually they are performed one small misstep at a time. — A. Lee Martinez

But all memories, no matter how distant, no matter how distorted, have the shadow of truth underneath. Even the most imperfect memory is a window - — A. Lee Martinez

The women kept their smiles, although both their thumping hearts dropped from their throats to land hard back in their rib cages. For Miriam at least, this was less a metaphor, as siren hearts wandered a bit through their bodies depending on their mood. But to be accurate, hers hadn't risen all the way to her throat, stopping as high as her sternum before sliding its way down and resting on her bladder, thus adding a need to urinate to her disappointment. — A. Lee Martinez

He hasn't earned your your mercy."
Nessy replied, "Mercy isn't earned. It's given. — A. Lee Martinez

Quiet descended, a silence so consuming that even the drafty corridors ceased whistling. Bog wasn't certain where to look, so he solved the problem by plucking out his eyes and sticking them in a drawer. — A. Lee Martinez

The middle was where it was too easy to be lazy and cynical at the same time. — A. Lee Martinez