Crime Mystery Quotes & Sayings

From Chapter 1:
"You're not a local." I paused, unsure. "Or are you?"
"Sort of. Randall Van Dotson is my dad. I'm Rennie."
After tossing her head that coy, sweet way girls do, she gave me a candid appraisal. — Ed Lynskey

She smiled as though someone had just offered her, the oldest virgin in town, a fully functioning Kingsize Vibro vibrator and a deluxe inhibition bypass. — Andrew Barrett

Chase stooped to inspect it. Angelo handed him a latex glove, which took Chase three attempts to pull on before tearing it. He had never had a good relationship with latex. He tried two more, tearing each one of those too. — Stefania Mattana

There was a brown substance inside and Chase had no doubt: it was heroin. Only a tiny amount, but very pure. - Cutting Right to the Chase Vol.2 — Stefania Mattana

Do it once and do it right and do it quickly — Lee Child

Like a submarine ejecting ballast, he bobbed to the surface as another sense pulled his eyelids all the way open like roller blinds in the old cartoons. — Andrew Barrett

The professor's motive was in the grand scheme of things terribly petty " Greenwood said. ""Pilate's Cross" is inspired by the questions this terrible crime created but as a work of fiction it is set in a different place and time and has a more complex motive for the murders. — J. Alexander Greenwood

For the movement was without scruples; she rolled towards her goal unconcernedly and deposed the corpses of the drowned in the windings of her course. Her course had many twists and windings; such was the law of her being. And whosoever could not follow her crooked course was washed on to the bank, for such was her law. The motives of the individual did not matter to her. His conscience did not matter to her, neither did she care what went on in his head and his heart. The Party knew only one crime: to swerve from the course laid out; and only one punishment: death. Death was no mystery in the movement; there was nothing exalted about it: it was the logical solution to political divergences — Arthur Koestler

No one mentioned the sad piece of tinsel, naked in places, hanging across the chimneybreast, nor that Twelfth Night was a week ago. No one mentioned the two Christmas cards on the mantelpiece. No one mentioned them because inside they were blank. — Andrew Barrett

... but his problem was infinity; his problem was time running along the x-axis versus stress running along the y-axis, and there never seemed to be time without stress. Stress was a constant. — Andrew Barrett

The sliver of sun turned water crystals among the coal-colored clouds into the halo of a sundog. — B.V. Lawson

The intoxication of frenzy and, ultimately, some suitable crime reveal
in a moment the whole meaning of a life. Without exactly advocating crime, the romantics insist on
paying homage to a basic system of privileges which they illustrate with the conventional images of the
outlaw, the criminal with the heart of gold, and the kind brigand. Their works are bathed in blood and
shrouded in mystery. The soul is delivered, at a minimum expenditure, of its most hideous desires
desires that a later generation will assuage in extermination camps. Of course these works are also a
challenge to the society of the times. But romanticism, at the source of its inspiration, is chiefly concerned
with defying moral and divine law. That is why its most original creation is not, primarily, the
revolutionary, but, logically enough, the dandy. — Albert Camus

He launched into the color-tsunami of Prokofiev's fourth piano sonata. It soon carried him onto a distant shore where the only thing broken was the silence. — B.V. Lawson

When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma, California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring afternoon. — James Crumley

Have you ever been in jail, mate? Whatever you did in your life, nothing can be compared to a single day in jail. — Stefania Mattana

I am not their f*****g entertainment. And I am not a f*****g hero! Given the choice, a hero would do exactly the same again. I wouldn't. Okay? — Andrew Barrett

She believed not in divine salvation but in the proposition that we poor mortals are fully capable of saving ourselves, if conditions and inclinations are right, and the evidence of this potential is found in the smallest of gestures, like the uncertain resting of a large hand on a bony shoulder. — Jeffery Deaver

There are times when you have to commit a crime to prevent an even bigger one. At least, that's what I tell myself when I can't sleep at night. — Judy Penz Sheluk

Finally, the water level topped off, leaving him with no more air to breathe. He drew his last breath and slipped down deep into the darkness that claimed his soul. — Wyatt Michael

I am the prosecutor. I represent the state. I am here to present to you the evidence of a crime. Together you will weigh this evidence. You will deliberate upon it. You will decide if it proves the defendant's guilt. — Scott Turow

I felt it burn all the way down my throat and into my stomach. I felt like I was dying. — Jeannie Walker

It's strange when you think about it. There are hundreds and hundreds of murders in books and television. It would be hard for narrative fiction to survive without them. And yet there are almost none in real life, unless you happen to live in the wrong area. Why is it that we have such a need for murder mystery? And what is it that attracts us? The crime, or the solution? Do we have some primal need of bloodshed because our own lives are so safe, so comfortable? — Anthony Horowitz

Crime novels have a clear beginning, middle, and end: a mystery, its investigation, and its resolution. The reader expects events to play out logically and efficiently, and these expectations force the writer to spend a good deal of time working on macrostructure rather than prettifying individual sentences. — Jesse Kellerman

They've also asked me now to start on another series that we're gonna do after this Frontier Earth. But it's not science fiction, it's more in the Mystery and Crime division and that's another area I'm very interested in. — Bruce Boxleitner

Had a big trial. It was like an Errol Flynn movie. — Jeannie Walker

My mother believed in all superstitions, plus she made some up. — Donald E. Westlake

No matter which way you dice it, self-preservation is selfish. — Keith Houghton

He threw himself to his knees at the stone and tore his damning testimony from the pages of its testament. He held the only evidence of his identity in his hand and in one motion of forfeit and justice he cast it into the fire. — Wyatt Michael

Chase rushed after her in pursuit. The woman lost one of her high-heeled shoes and Chase took advantage of her lack of balance to tackle her. They crashed to the ground.
"Why are you running from the ball, Cinderella?" he asked. — Stefania Mattana

Dreema and you disagree. She cottons to Richmond, but you can't be weaned off Pelham. So I offer you a fair middle ground: relocate to northern Virginia. She transfers to the state morgue on Braddock Road, and you get to stay near your old beat. — Ed Lynskey

In Haven, old houses didn't settle. They carried a life of their own, and Blackwater farm was no exception. This was a house that would never be a home. The best they could hope for would be to co-exist with the ghosts of the past.
- The Silent Twin — Caroline Mitchell

It is the Valley of Fear, the Valley of Death. The terror is in the hearts of the people from the dusk to the dawn. Wait, young man, and you will learn for yourself.

---Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — Donna Cummins

The northern star changes its position every ten thousand years, but friendships can last for all eternity.
- RJPeters — R.J. Peters

She had been lying there, facedown in the water long before the tide had turned at 3.04 that morning. Her eyes were staring into the river, her blonde hair first fanning out, then drawing back under her head with the wash of the water, like a pulsating jellyfish. The belt of her raincoat was caught on the branches of an overhanging tree and she'd been hooked, destined to forever flap against the corner of the broken pier with outstretched arms. She wasn't going anywhere now; she was simply bobbing up and down with the rhythm of the water - and she hadn't blinked in a long while. — A.J. Waines

That's how it is for us servants. No one pays you much heed; mostly you're invisible as furniture. Yet you overhear a conversation here, and add a little gossip there. A writing desk lies open and you cannot help but read a paper. Then you find something, something you should not have found ... — Martine Bailey

That's what you need to be writing about. Not the increased crime rate, but the increased tolerance for criminals to do whatever they want and not be held accountable. — Diane Moore

Humanity thrown together in the equivalent of a Petri dish under a microscope bred malignant organisms as often as benign. — B.V. Lawson

When the lights suddenly go out, hold onto your diamonds for dear life. - Nancy Drew, The Mystery of Lilac Inn — Carolyn Keene

And the more I thought of what had happened, the wilder and darker it grew. I reviewed the whole extraordinary sequence of events as I rattled on through the silent gas-lit streets. There was the original problem: that at least was pretty clear now. The death of Captain Morstan, the sending of the pearls, the advertisement, the letter, - we had had light upon all those events. They had only led us, however, to a deeper and far more tragic mystery. The Indian treasure, the curious plan found among Morstan's baggage, the strange scene at Major Sholto's death, the rediscovery of the treasure immediately followed by the murder of the discoverer, the very singular accompaniments to the crime, the footsteps, the remarkable weapons, the words upon the card, corresponding with those upon Captain Morstan's chart, - here was indeed a labyrinth in which a man less singularly endowed than my fellow-lodger might well despair of ever finding the clue. — Arthur Conan Doyle

History buffs expect historical background in historical fiction. Mystery readers expect forensics and police procedure in crime fiction. Westerns - gasp - describe the West. Techno-thriller readers expect to learn something about technology from their fiction. — Edward M. Lerner

Please don't complicate the investigation by offering an explanation that might actually be true.
--Marjorie Branell-Markson — Jennifer A. Girardin

The smell of beer surrounded him in a cloud as if he'd been doused in Eau de Frat Boy cologne. — B.V. Lawson

Death by misadventure sounds like a hopeful possibility.
--Marjorie Branell-Markson — Jennifer A. Girardin

Only a small, supernatural figure remained at the scene of the crime.* He did resolve one mystery while in Salem: indeed the devil needs conscious human collusion to work evil. — Stacy Schiff

I am honored and humbled by the fine reviews my new book "Why We Lover Serial Killers" is receiving. — Scott A. Bonn

It had been more or less the same for Jilly. Except that she had her parents there to field any phone calls, to accept the flowers at the door and pick up the cards that dropped like tears through the letterbox. She sat before her dressing table mirror in bra and pants and let time drip away, watching a face she didn't recognise and feeling raw emotions eat away at the drugs she was on. The emotions were gradually winning. — Andrew Barrett

Its aura distorts hard edges. Shimmering vortices of discoloration boil off, swirling, licking the
cold night air with bright spectral fire. Violence and death, this one's still hot. — Michael Allan Scott

Tito snored away on the other bed. Out there, all around them to the last fringes of occupancy, were Toobfreex at play in the video universe, the tropic isle, the Long Branch Saloon, the Starship Enterprise, Hawaiian crime fantasies, cute kids in make-believe living rooms with invisible audiences to laugh at everything they did, baseball highlights, Vietnam footage, helicopter gunships and firefights, and midnight jokes, and talking celebrities, and a slave girl in a bottle, and Arnold the pig, and here was Doc, on the natch, caught in a low-level bummer he couldn't find a way out of, about how the Psychedelic Sixties, this little parenthesis of light, might close after all, and all be lost, taken back into darkness ... — Thomas Pynchon

The man breathed deeply with his eyes shut and his speech trailed off. Nick approached the patient with the syringe in hand, nodding. He turned the machine up now, almost all the way, and then proceeded with the injection.
I think you're about ready. — Jackie Sonnenberg

At night in the town's countryside, you could just about feel and hear everything, but without using lamps, it was impossible to see anything other than shadows — Peter Fryer

Fuck you! Someone has tortured and killed one of your girls and you couldn't give a damn? I thought you were supposed to protect them, to be their guardian. Isn't that what pimps do?' Garcia's face flared red. — Chris Carter

In a mystery, the sleuth must be believably involved and emotionally invested in solving the crime. — Diane Mott Davidson

She was a tornado in a skirt. — B.V. Lawson

Success is not final, failure is not fatal. It is the courage to carry on that counts.
Winston Churchill — H.A. Corby

She was a cute as a washtub. — Raymond Chandler

We just have to sort through the junk. You know, like organising a jumbled box of beads. All we have to do is put each piece in its proper place, and we'll be able to see what we have. — Janice Peacock

At that exact moment, 6-0-0, the sun climbed over the skyline of oaks, revealing its full summer angry-god self. Its reflection flared across the river toward our house, a long, blaring finger aimed at me through our frail bedroom curtains. Accusing: You have been seen. You will be seen. — Gillian Flynn

We all have something special in us, it's a matter of finding it, and knowing what to do with it. — Robert Magarian

I'm snobby about books that aren't crime fiction: if I start reading a literary novel and there's no mystery emerging in the first few pages, I'm like, 'Gah, this obviously isn't a proper book. Why would I want to carry on reading it?' — Sophie Hannah

If one could order a crime as one does a dinner, what would you choose? ... Let's review the menu. Robbery? Frogery? No, I think not. Rather too vegetarian. It must be murder - red-blooded murder - with trimmings, of course. — Agatha Christie

You can run from the past, but it always catches up with you. — Debbi Mack

Lawyers aren't the most popular people, Miss Allen ... - Murder in Hand — Celia Conrad

Do we really mean it when we say 'in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer, until death do us part or do we add a silent clause, 'unless you shame me or disappoint me?' What is the cost of unconditional love and how capable are we of giving that? — Deirdre-Elizabeth Parker

The blight of office cubes housing lawyers and lobbyists had popped up like chokeweeds in the manicured lawn of the family homestead. — B.V. Lawson

Abigail ... His heart ached for his little girl, and the loss of his family drove like a blade through his heart. His head jerked up as the creak of a timber echoed overhead. If only they hadn't come to this god-forsaken place. — Caroline Mitchell

You don't like what you see out your window, you put up a wall. — Michael Connelly

Henry was now very annoyed; he had dug himself into a hole so deep that they didn't make a rope long enough. — Andrew Barrett

Sometimes stupid is crime enough. — Lois Greiman

Every time I think I'm about to seize the moment, it drifts back into the shadows, just beyond my reach. — Paula Hawkins

Life, like that water droplet, is everlasting and imperishable. There is only a transition, never an end ! — Rajib Mukherjee

What's the best place to hide a car? In an airport long-term lot. Like where's the best place to hide a grain of sand? On the beach — Lee Child

Listen to me you piece of shit, if you ever give the press information about me, my parents or even breathe a word about me to anyone ever again, I swear to god I will make it my mission to make your life a living hell. And, believe me I'll do it with a smile on my face the whole time. You're a worthless excuse for a Detective and everyone here knows it. You've screwed your way to the top and backstabbed Gena to get into your Captain's good books. Well look around you honey, you're a real star. No one stopped Gena or me taking you on. I've currently got you in a hold, where I could snap your neck if I wanted to, and not one person is stepping forward to help you. Yeah, you've really made it. - Stephanie Carovella to Sandra Barton — Nina D'Angelo

I am taken to the police station and they place me in an interrogation room. I am there for about thirty minutes before someone walks in. — Jorge Ortiz

Miss Lasqueti consumed mostly crime thrillers, which constantly seemed to disappoint her. I suspect that for her the world was more accidental than any book's plot. Twice I saw her so irritated by a mystery that she half rose from the shadow of her chair and flung the paperback over the railing into the sea. — Michael Ondaatje

You know you're writing a good thriller when you make yourself paranoid. — Shirley B. Garrett

Trap is a four-letter word, and like so many four-letter words it can mean something entirely else.
--Hugo Anstead — Jennifer A. Girardin

How men fear the chaos of the world, I thought, and the yawning eternity hereafter. So we build patterns to explain its terrible mysteries and reassure ourselves we are safe in this world and beyond. — C.J. Sansom

A wedge of sunlight slipped over the edge of the desk and fell noiselessly to the carpet. — Raymond Chandler

My life of crime began at seven twenty-eight this morning."
~ Charmaine Digby — Wendy Delaney

There's no such thing as a limit on being the best. You can always go for more. That's what it means to be human. No... That's what it means to be me. - Claire Stanfield — Ryohgo Narita

Before man can explore outer space he should first learn to explore the Inner Space of his mind. — Merlin Fraser

Bite me. -Lieutenant Eve Dallas, from any of the In Death books. — J.D. Robb

In fact, until the last moments of his life, until the last seconds as he gasped for breath, he never realised how much he wanted to live. But, at that point, death was inevitable and nothing that had happened could be changed. — Stephen Craig

He sidestepped down the alley and into another one connected to a small garage, where a raccoon with matching black eyes just like his own halted in mid-step next to a trash can.
They stared at each other, not moving or making a sound.
'There there, friend. I am not here to interrupt your nightly activity just as you are not here to interrupt mine.'
They continued their separate ways, who would be caught and who would not remained a mystery. — Jackie Sonnenberg

The sheriff peered over his eyeglasses and said, Your son is a suspect in the murder. — Jeannie Walker

I don't mind my friends calling me "Thornes," but the fact of people calling me "Prickly Thornes" draws the line. — Simi Sunny

Your mother is holding your hand too tightly. You whimper and cling to her dress, because you know what will happen next. She stares at you, as if she's forgotten how to blink. There's one last glimpse of her face before she bundles you into the cupboard under the stairs. 'Don't make a sound,' she hisses, 'don't even breathe.' Darkness smothers you as the key twists in the lock. There's a chance that he won't find you, cowering on the floor, between the broom and floor mops, a stack of wellington boots. — Kate Rhodes

Live life to the fullest and never forget the people that supported you along the way. — Dorothy W. Cosey

How easy would it be to let the words uncurl from my tongue and glide slowly into the space between us? Let them light up the room in bright-orange neon: Here's your answer! Here's what you need to know! It's an incredible thing to have that kind of power. To know that your words could change everything. — Jennifer Wolf Kam

Soon he would be able to touch her, to feel the warmth of her blood. When the time came, nothing would stop him. — Caroline Mitchell

He [Harry Bosch] defined good company not by the conversation but by the lack of it. When there was no need to talk to feel comfortable, that was the right company — Michael Connelly

The larger crimes are apt to be the simpler, for the bigger the crime, the more obvious, as a rule, is the motive. — Arthur Conan Doyle

She looked beautiful,standing there barefoot in her faded jeans. I wanted to take her in my arms, and lift her, and carry her into some untroubled future.
Instead, I left her where she was. That's not the world we live in, she'd said, and how right she was, — Stephen King

Blood doesn't speak of its owner. — Mita Jain

My heart is an empty refrigerator. — J.T. Lawrence

When I was in my early 20s, my dream was to write mystery novels. I wanted to do what my favourite crime writer, Ross Macdonald, did - crank out a book a year. The only problem - and it was a considerable one - was that I stank. — Linwood Barclay

Every man will tell you little boys should not play with dolls but ask any mother and they will tell you, every little boy has gone to sleep cuddled into one at one time in there life. — Peter Fryer

Just the night before, a puma's howl had set a chill at my spine and, man, life didn't get any richer than that. — Ed Lynskey

All his life Bosch had lived and worked in society's institutions. But he hope he had escaped institutional thinking, that he made his own decisions. — Michael Connelly

Redemption is for the weak. The strong keep sinning — Marvin Amazon