Spy Adventure Quotes & Sayings

Being a spy was something like standing on the south shore fending off a hurricane with a $2 poncho and an umbrella. — Lynn Blackmar

If you have read many adventure novels, you'll know that spies spend about half of their time in the sewers. They run along sewer tunnels, shooting. They find secret hideaways in sewers. They take weird funeral barges through sewers, poled along by old men in hoods. In fact, if a spy's kid wants to get a message to their mom or dad, the easiest way to do it is just to flush it down the toilet. — M T Anderson

Young people looking for adventure fiction now generally turn to fantasy, but for those of a certain age, the spy thriller has long been the escape reading of choice. — Michael Dirda

Classic music somehow changed, and it changed between the first and the second world wars, and somehow what happened was that the hero that had been the composer, the hero now was the performer, and especially the conductor. — Esa-Pekka Salonen

I talked to the computer at great length and explained my view of the Universe to it," said Marvin. "And what happened?" pressed Ford. "It committed suicide," said Marvin, — Douglas Adams

Life is not two sheets of paper, one black, one white. Life is a ream of paper, each page a different shade of gray. — Roland Smith

There is nothing new in the realization that the Constitution sometimes insulates the criminality of a few in order to protect the privacy of us all. — Antonin Scalia

In climbing, there was always a fraction of a second between the security of being locked in and the freedom of an actual rappel. — Paul Aertker

I turned on the water then returned to the door jamb. "That's not fair, you're nice and clean."
"I am?" He took a few steps toward me.
"Aren't you?"
"No," he scowled and shook his head. "I'm dirty. But you knew that."
Now, if you haven't heard an Irishman say the word "dirty" before, I will compare it with dynamite in your ovaries. They say it with like, seven Rs. — Nicole Castro

Decision it was only necessary for him to concentrate his attention for a few moments and the spirit moved him, and the best possible decision presented itself as though an inner voice had told him what to do. — Leo Tolstoy

Langley bred a certain type of person with great intention. The human resources department required nearly as sophisticated of analysts as the foreign intelligence department. Apply the massive computing technology of the CIA to hiring, along with the naive appeal of the exciting, though perhaps not so lucrative life of a spy, and any headhunter would be jealous of the results. — Lynn Blackmar

He is mighty in the near world, but curses his might as purchased with his harmony of soul, his innocence, his inner peace in life's embrace. — Peter Wessel Zapffe

My dad liked more macho adventure books like Shogun or spy novels. My mother reads murder mysteries. In fact, so does her mother, my grandma. That's where I trace the familial line of murder mystery obsession. — Christopher Bollen

Being shaken to death by a Hawaiian tourist look-alike was not how Arena imagined her death. — Lynn Blackmar

Simm watched the hanging with disgust. Why would the young man pretend to be a spy when he had no skills and no natural ability? As far as he could tell there had been no secret inks, no codes, and little effort to keep his movements secret. Maybe the world was better off without such fools; fledglings who fell out of the sky only to die on the ground. — Dory Codington

Anyone who thinks life is boring hasn't lived — Fred Cooper

Anything that doesn't fit this mode has been shoved into an area of lesser solemnity called 'genre fiction,' and it is here that the spy thriller and the crime story and the adventure story and the supernatural tale and the science fiction, however excellently written, must reside, sent to their rooms, as it were, for the misdemeanor of being enjoyable in what is considered a meretricious way. They invent, and we all know they invent, at least up to a point, and they are, therefore, not about 'real life,' which ought to lack coincidences and weirdness and action-adventure, unless the adventure story is about war, of course, where anything goes, and they are, therefore, not solid. — Margaret Atwood

I don't reinvent myself in any major way. It seems to be a slow evolution. I go back and visit certain themes that I feel strongly about and resonate with me emotionally. — James Taylor

People who are different are considered ineffective. People who can't hide their shortcomings are not considered a threat. A lot of spies rely on being unobtrusive, but we flat out flaunt the fact that we're different, and those we try to get information from put us on an even lower level than the ones they don't notice. They don't believe we're even capable of being a threat, and they misstep more than they might with someone they simply don't know. — Lynn Blackmar

Ark Storm - what if you could control the weather? — Linda Davies