Best Joe Abercrombie Quotes & Sayings

Pain is the best schoolmaster, as you will soon discover. — Joe Abercrombie

Fine lies beat tedious truths every time. — Joe Abercrombie

Men can have all manner of deeply held beliefs about the world in general that they find most inconvenient when called upon to apply to their own lives. Few people let morality get in the way of expediency. Or even convenience. A man who truly believes in a thing beyond the point where it costs him is a rare and dangerous thing. — Joe Abercrombie

But you love to play the good man, don't you? Do you know what's worse than a villain? A villain who thinks he's a hero. A man like that, there's nothing he won't do and he'll always find himself an excuse. — Joe Abercrombie

Trust. It was a word that only liars used. A word the truthful had no need of. — Joe Abercrombie

But it is easy to speak of the past, impossible to go there. I am powerful in ways you can only dream, yet I am still a prisoner of what I have done. I can never escape the cell I have made for myself. Things are what they are. — Joe Abercrombie

Crowds rarely cheer too loudly for the defeated, no matter how hard they fought, how great their sacrifices, how long the odds. Maidens might wet themselves over cheap and worthless victories, but they don't so much as blush for 'I did my best — Joe Abercrombie

Still, Logen had won over tougher audiences, in his time. Threetrees, Tul Duru, Black Dow, Harding Grim, he'd fought each one in single combat, and beaten them all. Spared each man's life, and left him bound to follow. Each one had tried their best to kill him, and with good reasons too, but in the end Logen had earned their trust, and their respect, and their friendship even. Small gestures and a lot of time, that was how he'd done it. 'Patience is the chief of virtues,' his father used to say, and 'you won't cross the mountains in a day.' Time might be against them, but there was nothing to be gained by rushing. You have to be realistic about these things. Logen — Joe Abercrombie

Bah. What does it matter now? There are no certainties let in the world. That was the age of great men, doing what was right." He frowned down at the broken rubble choking the floor of the colossal room. "This is the age of little men, doing what they must. Little men, with little dreams, walking in giant footsteps. — Joe Abercrombie

He felt a strange urge, right then, just to put his head down and walk past, off into the night and never look back. Then he wouldn't have to be the Bloody-Nine again... He could've gone far away, and started new, and been whoever he wanted. But he'd tried that once already, and it had done him no good. The past was always right behind him, breathing on his neck. It was time to turn around and face it. — Joe Abercrombie

Inquisitor Lorsen's thin lip curled. "There is truly nothing in you of what separates man from animal, is there? You are bereft of conscience. An utter absence of morality. You have no principle beyond the selfish."
Cosca's face hardened as he leaned forwards. "Perhaps when you have faced as many disappointments and suffered as many betrayals as I, you will see it - there is no principle beyond the selfish, Inquisitor, and men are animals. Conscience is a burden we choose to bear. Morality is the lie we tell ourselves to make its bearing easier. There have been many times in my life when I have wished it was not so. But it is so. — Joe Abercrombie

There was nothing to be gained by losing his temper. There was never anything to be gained by that. — Joe Abercrombie

The ground must be a general's best friend, or it becomes his worst enemy. — Joe Abercrombie

If she knew about the luggage, she was trouble. And Fallow had no sense of humour about his cock, to which none of the ointments had made the slightest difference. — Joe Abercrombie

As a writer, you have to first of all write what you want to. Listen to advice, by all means, but don't get bogged down in it. — Joe Abercrombie

On the battlefield there are no rules. — Joe Abercrombie

He tried to tell himself the dead are dead, but he knew Jenner had been right. Their ghosts stick in the minds of those that knew them, loved them, hated them. Those that killed them most of all. — Joe Abercrombie

What's the plan now, then?' 'Plans have a habit o' falling apart when you lean on 'em,' said Lamb. 'We'll just have to think up another.' The Kantic cracked a bastard of a frown. 'I do not like a man who breaks an agreement.' 'Try and push me off a cliff.' Lamb gave Jubair a flat stare. 'We can find out who God likes best.' Jubair pressed one fingertip against his lips and considered that for a long, silent moment. Then he shrugged. 'I prefer not to trouble God with every little thing. — Joe Abercrombie

He glanced over at Luthar, sneering down into his bowl as though it was full of piss. No respect. He glanced over at Ferro, staring yellow knives at him through narrowed eyes. No trust. He shook his head sadly. Without trust and respect the group would fall apart in a fight like walls without mortar.
Still, Logen had won over tougher audiences, in his time. Threetrees, Tul Duru, Black Dow, Harding Grim, he'd fought each one in single combat, and beaten them all. Spared each man's life, and left him bound to follow. Each one had tried their best to kill him, and with good reasons too, but in the end Logen had earned their trust, and their respect, and their friendship even. Small gestures and a lot of time, that was how he'd done it. 'Patience is the chief of virtues,' his father used to say, and 'you won't cross the mountains in a day.' Time might be against them, but there was nothing to be gained by rushing. You have to be realistic about these things. — Joe Abercrombie

That's what courage is. Taking your disappointments and your failures, your guilt and your shame, all the wounds received and inflicted, and sinking them in the past. Starting again. Damning yesterday and facing tomorrow with your head held high. Times change. It's those that see it coming, and plan for it, and change themselves to suit that prosper. — Joe Abercrombie

Where do we find allies?"
Father Yarvi smiled. "Among our enemies, where else? — Joe Abercrombie

Strange, how the best moments of our lives we scarcely notice except in looking back. — Joe Abercrombie

Death waits for us all. Nothing's forever. Life's about making the best of what you find along the way. A man who's not content with what he's got, well, more than likely he won't be content with what he hasn't. — Joe Abercrombie

Honest men are so very rare, they are often mistaken for criminals, for rebels, for madmen. What were your crimes, anyway, but to be different?'
'Robbery the first time, and I served seven years. When they caught me again there were eighty-four counts, with fourteen murders.'
Cosca cocked an eyebrow. 'But we're you truly guilty?'
'Yes'
He frowned for a moment then waved it away. 'Nobody's perfect. Lets leave the past behind us. — Joe Abercrombie

The birth of spring is perhaps not the best time to cross a mountain range,' observed Longfoot under his breath. Bayaz looked sharply sideways. 'Some would say the best time to cross an obstacle is when one finds oneself on the wrong side of it! Or do you suggest we wait for summer? — Joe Abercrombie

Power is a bloody mirage. The closer you seem to get the further away it is — Joe Abercrombie

Fearlessness is a fool's boast, to my mind. The only men with no fear in them are dead, or the soon to be dead, maybe. Fear teaches you caution, and respect for your enemy, and to avoid sharp edges used in anger. All good things in their place, believe me. Fear can bring you out alive, and that's the very best anyone can hope for from any fight. Every man who's worth a damn feels fear. It's the use you make of it that counts. — Joe Abercrombie

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. — Joe Abercrombie

I make no judgements on hearsay. — Joe Abercrombie

Unhappy times are the best for levity. You don't light candles in the middle of the day, do you? — Joe Abercrombie

I'm trying to put things in the best light, but a turd's a turd, whatever light it's in! — Joe Abercrombie

The best steel doesn't always shine the brightest. — Joe Abercrombie

Vengeance only walks a circle. From blood, back to blood. Death waits for us all. You can follow your path to her bent under a burden of rage. I did, for many years. You can let it poison you. — Joe Abercrombie

You want to be merciful. To stand in the light. I understand it. I admire it. But, my queen ... Only the victors can be merciful. — Joe Abercrombie

If there was a God, the world seemed exactly the way it would be if there wasn't one. — Joe Abercrombie

It was like staring at a whitewashed wall, but without all the emotion — Joe Abercrombie

Her knee caught him between the legs with pitiless accuracy, driving the wind from his chest, making him teeter for a breathless moment, then bringing him down like a sledgehammer to a house of cards. As he slid groaning to the carpet in that special, shooting agony that only a blow to the fruits can produce, it was little consolation that he had been right.
His Queen was quite evidently a woman of rare and fiery passion. — Joe Abercrombie

If you clenched your teeth hard enough, and took enough strides, you could get anywhere. One painful, weary, freezing, guilty step at a time. — Joe Abercrombie

When men say things used to be better, they invariably mean they were better for them, because they were young, and had all their hopes intact. — Joe Abercrombie

I don't see what I want to see, I see what I need to see. If you don't like it, see something else — Joe Abercrombie

All you can do is take each day as it comes. Try and do the best you can with what you're given. You won't always do the right thing, but you can try. And you can try to do the right thing next time. That, and stay alive. — Joe Abercrombie

What a place. Glokta stifled a smile. It reminds me of myself, in a way. We both were magnificent once, and we both have our best days far behind us. — Joe Abercrombie

What? A family?" Ninefingers frowned, rubbing grimly at the stump of his middle finger. "I did have one. And now I've got another. You don't pick your family, you take what you'er given and you make the best of it." He pointed at
Ferro, then at Quai. "You see her, and him, and you?" He slapped his hand down on Jezal's shoulder. "That's my family now, and I don't pal on losing a brother today, you understand? — Joe Abercrombie

The trouble with being able to lift heavy things is that when heavy things need lifting folk step out of the way and smile at you. — Joe Abercrombie

If life has taught me one thing, it's that there are no villains. Only people, doing their best. — Joe Abercrombie

I find hope is best abandoned early,' muttered Temple. — Joe Abercrombie

I got bigger problems than that life hasn't turned out the way you hoped. You can harp on the past all you please, Dow, like some old woman upset cause her tits used to stay up by themselves, or you can shut your fucking hole and help me get on with things. — Joe Abercrombie

Logen ambled over to him. If you're going to travel with a man, and maybe fight alongside him, it's best to talk, and laugh if you can. That way you can get an understanding, and then a trust. Trust is what binds a band together, and out there in the wilds that can make the difference between living or dying. Building that kind of trust takes time, and effort. Logen reckoned it was best to get started early, and today he had good humour to spare, so he stood next to Luthar and looked out at the park, trying to dream up some common ground in which to plant the seeds of an unlikely friendship. — Joe Abercrombie

The best lessons one teaches oneself. — Joe Abercrombie

You ever have the feeling you were in the wrong place? That if you could just get over the next hill, cross the next river, look down into the next valley, it'd all ... fit. Be right."
"All my life, more of less"
"All your life spent getting ready for the next thing. I climbed a lot of hills now. I crossed a lot of rivers. Crossed the sea even, left everything I knew and came to Styria. But there I was, waiting for me at the docks when I got off the boat, same man, same life. Next valley ain't no different from this one. No better anyway. Reckon I've learned ... just to stick in the place I'm at. Just to be the man I am. — Joe Abercrombie

Take everything as a compliment, you can never be insulted. — Joe Abercrombie

Vengeance is a way of clinging to what we have lost. A wedge in the Last Door, and through the crack we can still glimpse the faces of the dead. We strain towards it with all our being, break every rule to have it, but when we clutch it, there is nothing there. Only grief. — Joe Abercrombie

Fear not, my doves!" Thorn jumped as someone flung an arm around her shoulders. The strange woman who had watched Thorn fight Brand a few days before thrust her gray-stubbled skull between her and her mother. "For the wise Father Yarvi has placed your daughter's education in my dextrous hands."
Thorn hadn't thought her spirits could drop any lower, but the gods had found a way. "Education?"
The woman hugged them tighter, her smell a heady mix of sweat, incense, herbs and piss. "It's where I teach and you learn."
"And who ... " Thorn's mother gave the ragged woman a nervous look, "or what ... are you?"
"Lately, a thief." When that sharpened nervousness into alarm she added brightly, "but also an experienced killer! — Joe Abercrombie

That's what an idiot does when he gets angry. He destroys whatever's nearest, even if it's his own house! — Joe Abercrombie

They say a man lost in the desert must take such water as he is offered, no matter who it comes from. I — Joe Abercrombie

You look especially beautiful this morning, Monza.' She sighed, as if that was an accident. As if she hadn't spent an hour preening herself before the mirror. 'Facts are facts. Stating them isn't a gift. You only prove you're not blind.' She yawned, stretched in her saddle, made him wait a moment longer. 'But I'll hear more. — Joe Abercrombie

The world is full of monsters, after all. Perhaps the best one can hope for is to have the most terrible on your side. — Joe Abercrombie

You're no fun at all, you boys, you do nothing but worry. You need to think on the sunny side o' this. The worst that can happen is that Bethod don't show!'
'The worst?' Dogman stared at him. 'You sure? What about if Bethod does come, and his Carls kick your wall over like a pile o' turds and kill every last one of us?'
Crummock's brow furrowed. He frowned down at the ground. He squinted up at the clouds. 'True,' he said, breaking out in a smile. 'That is worse. You got a fast mind, lad.'
Dogman gave a long sigh, and stared down into the valley. — Joe Abercrombie

Cleverness is no guarantee of sensible behaviour. — Joe Abercrombie

Gold and silver is everything to everyone. Some of us have enough of it to pretend otherwise. — Joe Abercrombie

The more you give a man, the more he demands, and the less happy he becomes. No one ever appreciates what he gets for nothing. — Joe Abercrombie

Maybe there are only so many faces in the world. You get old enough, you start seeing 'em used again. Craw — Joe Abercrombie

The place smelled of smoke and sweat, of spilled drinks and sprayed vomit, of desperation and wasted chances — Joe Abercrombie

To fight my enemies I need friends behind me, and I'm clean out of friends. You have to be realistic. It's been a while since my ambitions went beyond getting through each day alive. — Joe Abercrombie

Madmen and fools feel no fear. Heroes fear and face the danger anyway. — Joe Abercrombie

Still, as Logen Ninefingers had been so very fond of saying: it was better to do it, than to live with the fear of it. He picked up his dress sword, but after a minute — Joe Abercrombie

Ain't it God's sword, fell from the sky? I thought it had to be passed on. Is it cursed?"
Craw took up the reins and turned back to the north. "Every sword's a curse, boy. — Joe Abercrombie

Jaud planted his fists on his hips. "You made it, then." "Some turds float," said Rulf. Ankran — Joe Abercrombie

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. — Joe Abercrombie

You are Shenkt? I expected more."
"Pray to whatever god you believe in that you never see more."
"I do not pray."
Shenkt leaned close, and whispered in his ear. "I advise you to start. — Joe Abercrombie

The wise wait for their moment, but never let it pass. — Joe Abercrombie

Strange how, as long as the hardship lasts, we can stand it. As soon as the crisis is over, the strength all leeches away in an instant. — Joe Abercrombie

Bayaz chuckled. "The Bloody-Nine, scared of shadows? I'd never have believed it." "Every shadow's cast by something," growled the Northman, — Joe Abercrombie

If you believe that I chose any part of the pitiful shadow of a life you see before you, you are very much mistaken. I chose glory and success. The box did not contain what was written on the lid." "The — Joe Abercrombie

Logen still remembered the first time he had to leave someone behind, remembered it like it was yesterday. Strange how the boy's name had gone but the face was with him still. — Joe Abercrombie

Well, well, well. The mighty Uthman-ul-Dosht comes with mercy, and offers peace. These are strange times we live in, eh, Tulkis? Have the Gurkish learned to love their enemies? Or simply fear them?'
'One need not love one's enemy, or even fear him, to desire peace. One need only love oneself.'
'Is that so?'
'It is. I lost two sons in the wars between our peoples. One at Ulrioch in the last war. He was a priest, and burned in the temple there. The other died not long ago, at the siege of Dagoska. He led the charge when the first breach was made.'
Glokta frowned and stretched out his neck. A hail of flatbow bolts. Tiny figures, falling in the rubble. 'That was a brave charge.'
'War is harshest on the brave. — Joe Abercrombie

You carry on. That's what he'd always done. That's the task that comes with surviving, whether you deserve to live or not. You remember the dead as best you can. You say some words for them. Then you carry on, and you hope for better. — Joe Abercrombie

First it is done to us, then we do it to others, then we order it done. Such is the way of things — Joe Abercrombie

Dimbik had once been told that the best soldiers are rarely courageous. That was when he had been sure it was the career for him. He started to slide one hand towards his sword, far from sure what he would do with it once it reached the hilt. — Joe Abercrombie

A man lost in the desert must take such water as he is offered, no matter who it comes from. — Joe Abercrombie

Could you just ask? I know we used to hate each other but I've come to think I might like you quite a lot. Any chance you like me, at all? Gods, it sounded absurd. All her life she'd been pushing folk away, she had no idea where to start at pulling one in. What if he looked at her as if she was mad? The thought yawned like a pit at her feet. What do you mean, like? Like, like like? Should she just take hold of him and kiss him? She kept thinking about it. She hardly thought about anything else any more. — Joe Abercrombie

You don't pick your family, you take what you're given and you make the best of it. — Joe Abercrombie