"Gloria, the world—hell, the whole damned universe—is divided into just two groups: meat eaters and meat. It has been my experience that the former never feels sorry for the latter."

"“You’re sure of that, are you?” “I’m the best there is, so why shouldn’t I have the best job?” “Modest, too,” commented Redwine dryly. “The next modest whore you meet will be the first,” replied Suma."

"“Contrary to what you may think about prostitutes, Harry, none of us were brought up to screw in front of an audience. But after a couple of lives get saved because Security sees a problem developing, and after you realize that they’re not simply a batch of drooling voyeurs at the other end of the monitors, you come to accept and appreciate them, and after a while you don’t even think of them at all.” She paused. “One of the first things a prostitute learns how to do is not think of things, especially while they’re happening to her.”"

"“I’ve revised my opinion,” he announced. “About what?” asked Mr. Ahasuerus. “About how long it’s going to take Man to conquer the galaxy once he figures out how to travel to the stars.” Flint took a long swallow of his beer and wiped his mouth off with a sweaty shirtsleeve. “I give us three weeks, tops.” He paused again. “That’s twenty days to decide whether it’s worth the effort, and one afternoon to pull it off.”"

"“Procyon III does have a gravity identical to Earth’s,” said Mr. Ahasuerus apologetically. “I suspect it’s also about as heavily populated as Saskatchewan.” “I am unacquainted with that location,” said the blue man. “So is everyone else.”"

"I was so average, Tojo. Even after I stopped being fat I was just an average girl with average parents and average grades and average friends. I was always afraid I was going to have an average husband and sleep with him 3.4 times a week and have 2.2 children."

"“Did you not ever want to see what was beyond the next hill, what strange and unique civilizations lay beyond your own?” “Until I got there,” answered Monk."

"“What would you be if you could be anything at all?” she asked. “Happy.”"

"The Carnies’ First Commandment is that you never offend a mark until he’s spent all his money."

"“Is it true?” “Probably. But just for the record, is what true?”"

"“I don’t believe you.” “What you believe is of no importance to me.”"

"“It is a world of bitter extremes of climate and a totalitarian theocracy.” “That he believes in,” said Thaddeus. “Believing in his religion makes it no less oppressive,” said Albert emotionlessly."

"“Enough screaming and yelling!” he yells. “I expect you to behave with some decorum. After all, this is a bar, not City Hall.”"

"“It is an honest wager on an honest fight between two evenly-matched masters of the fistic arts,” says Pedro. “Who would have believed it?” says Benny. “Believed what?” asks Pedro. “You manage to cram five lies into an eighteen-word sentence,” answers Benny."

"“Let’s be reasonable,” suggests Bet-a-Bunch Murphy, which I personally think would make a pleasant change."

"Benny shakes his head. “This is America, Lamont,” he says. “America’s out there somewhere!” growls Lamont, waving his hand toward the door. “This is Manhattan.”"

"Nobody reaches a position of authority without the ability to be a back-stabbing bastard when the chips are down."

"“Maybe things are different on his world.” “As near as I can tell, there’s one basic law anywhere you go in the universe: the strong eat the weak.”"

"She is unique, even among women, who are all unique, each in their own alien way."

"“It's a good, professional outline,” he said at last. “I am not qualified to offer subjective artistic opinions,” said Cupid. “Take my word for it. It's got songs, it's got romance, it's got laughs, it's got a happy ending, and I guarantee the audience won't have to think.” He shrugged. “It may be silly as hell, but it'll make a hundred million credits.” He paused, then shook his head sadly. “You’d think an audience would have better taste.”"

"“I never said that.” “You never had to,” he replied with a smile. “I’m good at my job, remember? And part of that job is listening to what people say and figuring out what they mean.”"

"“You’re a fool, Harry.” “I know,” he said softly. “That doesn’t make you any less of one,” she replied."

"Redwine wondered what the going price of a conscience was, but named a figure that seemed to hover just between the top end of Reasonable and the bottom of Ostentatious."

"It was an art form, and you don’t learn to be an artist. You’re either born one, or you aren’t."

"“He has willpower to spare,” I say. “Unfortunately, what he lacks is won’tpower.”"

"Don't go alone to lonely places."

""And stay away from the wrong people." "You never know who's who," Lucas said."

"They don't worry too much if they get the wrong man," Ernest said. "They reckon whoever they get is probably guilty of something. Or would have been eventually. And if he didn't do anything, he probably wanted to."

"Everyone loses everything in the end."

"The fact is," Nuala said, "we're in different situations. For each of us it's different."

"Discretion came hard to Lucas, who tended to think slowly and aloud, but it was time to try a little harder."

"It can't be an easy thing," Lucas said, "to make a country. It's tough enough to make a café. Or to make one be the way you imagined it. Unless you only let certain people in and keep the rest out."

"Don't laugh at my fantasies," she said. "Not if you want to be in them."

"And that was it, he thought. It was all a series of rooms one never found one's way out of. You had to be content with that, or die, or go completely crazy."

"He kept not looking at her. This, Sonia had come to realize, usually meant something, though it was often difficult to decide what. Shyness, morbid hypersensitivity and homicidal racism could all assume the same aspect."

"Over and over our plans foundered on human nature. On the mediocrity of human nature that betrays its better self, its best ideals, that is unworthy of itself everywhere. "Shocking, the mediocrity of everything - is it not?"

"One wore a brown army-style sweater, extensively darned and full of holes. The darning was old and unraveling; it looked as if someone had once cared enough to repair his sweaters and then just given up."

""Lately we seem to get into arguments about what the country's about." "I thought that was the national pastime." "It is," Ernest said."

""Believe only what you know," he said."

"She did not want to bury him here, she thought, under a twisted wire cross. There was a stone vault for him under the lime trees in California, where he could sleep with all those other shadows who had worn down their steps on carpeted altars by candlelight. Broken their hearts, minds, sex and entrails in the imperfect service of their Holy One, their Hanged Man."

"In all the working systems, she thought, the weakness was always yourself - that spot of gristle in the gears. It applied on every level - even the act of getting through a day could be performed with gusto and dispatch if you kept out of your own way. Justin believed that she knew as much as anyone about self-struggle."

"He thought she was a unicorn to be speared, penned, and adored. He wanted her white goodness, wanted a skin of it. He wanted to wash in it, to drink and drink and drink of it."

"People liked to get you thinking you were small-time. That way, they made out and you got fucked. It was that way now, he thought: they were in the cabin talking big-time scores and he was hauling groceries for them. They might pay him or they might not; he was a yo-yo to them. One of life's little yo-yos. But the fact was, they were old and soft. They were making it big, they had made their move, but they were soft. Surely, he thought, their day was over. It was someone else's turn now, someone smarter and tougher. And it was all in your mind; if you let weak people buffalo you, they would keep you down. He had been letting them do it all his life and it was time to call them on it. He was young, he was strong, a soldier of fortune. He had seen them up close, they were nothing much. You had to take risks, there was nothing for free."

"There were two hungers and an illusion of fulfilment."

"A little cinder in the wind, Pablo - that's what you are." "Everybody's worth something," Pablo said. "I mean - everybody's life got some meaning to it. You know - there's a reason for people." "No kidding? A reason for you? What is it?" "I don't know," Pablo confessed. "I ain't found out yet. But I know there is one."

"What I wonder," Bob Cole said in his strange tremulous voice, "is whether the people down here have to live this way so that we can live the way we do. We have to believe it's no, don't we? We couldn't face up to it otherwise. Because if most of the world lives in this kind of poverty so that we can have our goodies and our extra protein ration - what does that make us?"

"We have a proverb, sir, in my grandfather's country. In his island. I'm positive they have the same proverb in China. It goes 'To trust is good. Not to trust is better.'"

"You see," Heath said, "I'm the wrath of God in my tiny way. I don't go seeking out the misguided and the perverse, not at all. Those afflicted find me. I'm the shark on the bottom of the lagoon. You have to sink a damn long way before you get to me. When you do, I'm waiting."

"It's what you want, he told himself. Don't obsess over it. Do it."

"When you get too far from Madison, Wisconsin, it gets unsanitary," Tom Zecca said. "The people get funny-looking and it's hot." "My grandfather," Tom Zecca told them, "always said to me - kid, you don't know how lucky you are to live in America. Back there it's all shit. You take your hat off and you eat dirt. Here you got it made."