Thriller movies have a unique way of gripping our attention, combining suspense, tension, and unforgettable moments that stick with us long after the credits roll. One of the best ways to relive that excitement is through the iconic quotes that capture the essence of these edge-of-your-seat stories. In this post, we’ve gathered 146 of the best thriller movie quotes that showcase the genre’s intensity, wit, and unforgettable dialogue. Whether you’re a longtime fan or new to thrillers, these quotes are sure to inspire and thrill you.
1. “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.” - Jeffrey Deaver
2. “Life is volatile.” - Robert J. Pajer
3. “Had a big trial. It was like an Errol Flynn movie.” - Jeannie Walker
4. “I am who I am and always shall be.” - Laura Elizabeth
5. “In darkness there is death.” - Bob Mayer
6. “The reader is the final arbiter.” - Sam Reaves
7. “When you have to kill the same terrorist twice in one week, then there's either something wrong with your skills or something wrong with your world. And there's nothing wrong with my skills.” - Jonathan Maberry
8. “The sweetest smiles hold the darkest secrets...” - Sara Shepard
9. “From Chapter 1:The main rub was the lack of RnR and I burned out. Three years and three stripes later, I ejected from the MP Corps, vowing I'd never do police or criminal investigative work again. Instead, I returned home when I should've learned better.” - Ed Lynskey
10. “That sure as fuck ain't no cow” - Scott Sigler
11. “I do not possess the ability to draw or paint.I can’t sing or dance.I can’t knit or sew. But I am an artist. I have the ability to put onto paper, words that tell an intriguing story. I am a writer. A writer is someone who, with just words, can paint a beautiful picture. A writer can open up a world of imagination you didn’t realize was possible. When you open up a book and become so consumed in the story, you feel like you’re a part of it… you’re standing next to that character and feeling the same way that character feels, That’s the art of a writer. I am an artist. My inspiration is the world around me.My paintbrush is my words.My easel is my computer.My canvas is the mind of my reader.” - Aubrey Becker
12. “She shoved her hands in the deep silk-lined pockets…where she felt the cold steel of a revolver.” - Sherry Morris
13. “My life is hard. No one would rob me of that. The clothes I am wearing came out of a knotted up black plastic trash bag from a resale shop downtown. And not the downtown where shiny cars wink at you in the sunlight. If a car winks at you in this area it’s being driven by a person you would be best to avoid. My side of downtown is crumbling and skirted by chain link fences.--Rocky Evans” - Gwenn Wright
14. “Do not be so ridiculous, I can more easily find you someone else.” Gripping the bars of his prison so strongly that the bones of his knuckles showed prominently through his pale skin, the monster growled again, “I will have no other.” Nearing the end of his patience, Klaus demanded, “Why? Why are you being so impossible?” Turning to the diminutive creature beneath the blanket, he smiled nastily, his light red eyes gleaming, “Because he wants her.” - Gwenn Wright
15. “Life is a sewer and we are all but swimmers within it. Smart people do the backstroke. (In other words you gotta have a giggle.)” - Stephen B. Pearl
16. “A good book is a good place to go..... to dream!” - Donna Lee Comer
17. “I'm not afraid of dying. I'm afraid I'll never get a chance to live!” - A.A. Bell
18. “I was such a messed up person and he was still holding on.” - Holly Hood
19. “Jane woke, stretched, and decided to kill herself. If she hadn’t found a reason to live by the end of the day she would jump from the rig. It felt good to have a plan.” - Adam Baker
20. “The young all have the same dream: to save the world. Some quickly forget this dream, convinced that there are more important things to do, like having a family, earning money, traveling, and learning a foreign language. Others, though, decide that it really is possible to make a difference in society and to shape the world we will hand on to future generations.” - Paulo Coelho
21. “Democrats and Republicans were essentially the same party with different faces and that was why, no matter how many promises each leader made, significant change rarely transpired.” - James Morcan, Lance Morcan
22. “My heart, for unknown reasons, seems to freeze in motion in my chest. I can see he senses it and he holds his pause to enjoy my suffering, prolonging my ignorance. “Viktor, what?” - Gwenn Wright
23. “And, with much of Europe occupied by Nazi Germany, and Mussolini's armies in Albania, on the Greek frontier, one wasn't sure what came next. So, don't trust the telephone. Or the newspapers. Or the radio. Or tomorrow.” - Alan Furst
24. “When Carri died, I felt like I had lost everything, except my life, and my memories of her. Now I can’t even dream of her...” - Richard Finney
25. “Oh God,” Jenna said, “will you shut up and kiss me before I change my mind?” - Richard Finney
26. “I believe that on any trip to heaven, there are always detours through hell.” - Richard Finney
27. “The men were smashing windows and aiming their weapons through them. The driver had opened the door and was shouting for the women and children to get out and run and hide. But Ilina realized in some vague way that he never managed to actually say the word "hide." He really said, "Women and children, get out, get out, get out! Run and..." The clerk's wife thought it was odd that he had stopped in the middle of a sentence, and even stranger that she herself knew the word, heard the word "hide" in her head when the driver stopped talking.” - Clark Zlotchew
28. “It doesn't cost anything to pay attention.” - Scott Cherney
29. “The nation has been turned upside down and inside out. The country that was once discovered by people seeking religious freedom is now oppressing religious rights. It has been a slow train rumbling down the track of destruction since the 1960's. It started with the removal of the Bible from our public schools. Next the generation known as the 'love generation' opened the door for the approval of sex outside of marriage. For every ten years since then, it's been a slippery slope of materialism, I got mine, what can you do for me, and money is power. "We as a nation have stopped focusing on God and family and replaced them with money and success. Parents are teaching their children to do whatever it takes to get ahead...just don't get caught. If you do, find someone to blame it on.” - Rick Mayhew
30. “After everything I've been through, the last thing I'm going to apologize for is my paranoia.” - Richard Finney
31. “"One cannot be a mother without first being a person; family, husband, and children should not be allowed, as is so often the case, to steal a woman’s selfhood and her dreams." Mother to Sherlock, Mycroft, and Enola Holmes by author Nancy Springer” - Vannessagrace
32. “Another tug and a yank at my chestnut curls and she snarls at me, “You are so much like her.”This is something my mother often says and never explains. Though it is a great mystery to me it is also a blessing, for she always hurries from the room after saying it.” - Gwenn Wright
33. “If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there".” - Brian Bianco
34. “Hell had frozen over and I was lost in its endless labyrinth.” - Cameo Renae
35. “A quick thought shot through my mind. Could I really drown in a dream? I remembered the movie the Matrix. If you died in the matrix, you died in real life. I wasn’t about to take a chance...” - Cameo Renae
36. “This is what people were looking at all day? How embarrassing! I looked like Quasimodo! My guests were exceptional actors.” - Cameo Renae
37. “Just a friendly warning: the forces of spiritual darness are nothing to trifle with. Vampires do exist, no matter what the so-called scientific minds might say, and they ARE dangerous!” - C.c. Brown
38. “A fallow mind is a field of discontent.” - John H. Cunningham
39. “Truth is irrelevant; what matters is what people believe.” - Henry Mosquera
40. “If I don't defend for myself, who will?” - Wesley T. Calaway
41. “Maligned –powerfully-drawn characters acting out a disturbing view of our future.” -David Compton, New York Times Best-Selling author” - Kathleen Papajohn
42. “The finest thing in the world is knowing how to belong to oneself.Michel de Montaigne” - Laurie Stevens
43. “She knew with chilling and absolute certainty she was next.” - Alexa Grace
44. “What’s the hurry? From my experience, dead bodies don’t get any deader.” - David Harry
45. “Is this Jimmy Redstone?” the male voice at the other end of the line inquired. I couldn’t identify the voice. I didn’t recognize the number and the used car salesman tone didn’t do anything to reduce my annoyance at being interrupted during breakfast. “Who the hell you think would be answering his phone?” I snarled.” - David Harry
46. “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
47. “People have incredible nerve to do terrible things, but never actually admit to them.” - Henry Mosquera
48. “The purpose of having the orphans study all these diverse fields was not for them to just become geniuses, but to become polymaths – meaning they would be geniuses in a wide variety of fields.” - James Morcan, Lance Morcan
49. “Some things are just like riding a bicycle; you jump on, pedal, and hope you don’t fall.” - Henry Mosquera
50. “Sometimes the hardest journeys are the ones that begin with little hope. But we need to take them anyway.” - Richard Finney
51. “I don’t care what Einstein said about God not playing dice; If he exists, he’s addicted to craps.” - Henry Mosquera
52. “WEST SALEM ~ October 2011A sudden vision, fraught with malevolence and darkness, obscured her sight. The face of a menacing figure turned from the shadows of his grisly handiwork and stared at Sorcha.Her muscles tensed. By the Goddess, could he see her?Please! No!She wanted to scream, to run, but the vision ensnared her into the horrific moment like a fly in a spider's web.” - Chérie De Sues
53. “From one small spark a bushfire grows.Sellers of misery are our foes.Merging ruthlessly tongues of flame.Point your finger at those to blame.” - Paul Anthony
54. “Marisa starts to snoop. I might as well too. It's not often that I get to visit a water pellet company in a freaky refugee nation. -from Fireseed One” - Catherine Stine
55. “No evil ever came from a woman’s womb that wasn’t placed there first by a man.’... Tantie Neptune, Lucifer's Key by Charles A. Cornell, due 2013” - Charles A. Cornell
56. “Some may call me a vigilante. I think i've got problems to fix.” - Matt Hilton
57. “Listen, we got two stiffs and a river of red in a villa in Herne Bay...” - Rhys Chamberlain
58. “You may suppose that perhaps this Walter T. Wallace found his destiny in food and passed down to his progeny a legacy like that of the great Colonel Sanders. The folks here in Wallace County would love to be able to tell you this is so. But no, like their granddaddy, the Wallace men were thievin’ crooks, always with a scheme ready to separate the weak from their hard-earned money.” - Gwenn Wright
59. “The door suddenly opened. A leggy young brunette took two steps into the office and stopped short. Her brown eyes widened, she hastily excused herself and turned to leave. Pérez’s jaw dropped as he looked up at her high heels and ankles. He crawled out from under the desk and turned questioningly to his partner. Thorne didn't hesitate. He took one swift stride from behind, clamped a hand tightly over her mouth, and pulled her back into the room, disregarding her wildly flailing legs and frantic attempts to claw his hands away. He shut the door with a backward thrust of his foot. "What do we do now?" Pérez whined. "Observe." Thorne spoke calmly, as would a professor demonstrating a familiar operation to a beginner. Using both hands, he briskly snapped her neck. She stopped struggling.” - Clark Zlotchew
60. “Does it matter, when you read, if the person who wrote still lives?” - Michael Gruber
61. “One day you see a man walking down the road, the next day you come to his yard and find him dead... Why is it that he cannot do what the living do? It is because the thing that gave power to these parts is no longer there. That is the duppy, and that is the most powerful part of any man. Everybody has evil in them, and when a man is alive... he will not abandon himself to many evil things. But when the duppy leaves the body, it no longer has anything to restrain it and it will do more terrible things than any man ever dreamed of.- From 'Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica', Zora Neale Hurston, 1938” - Charles A. Cornell
62. “Her eyes were a rich dark brown that were so deep, they reminded me of my sleepless nights, awake, staring into complete darkness. I felt compelled to look deeper, searching for something inside her, but her soul was covered and her eyes would not show me.” - Cristina Martin
63. “A little politeness might smooth the way ahead. Knowing it was his turn to be dispatched, the best he could hope for was as swift a death as the one Massetti had so thanklessly received.” - Victoria Lamb
64. “This would become a lifelong pattern, sitting in my comfort zone high above the world in some sort of self-imposed exile.” - Peggy Kopman-Owens
65. “If you focus your eyes towards the horizon, everything and everyone walking in front of you becomes a blurry mass. That's what everyone else became. All of their dark wool suits began to mesh into one, and they began to rhythmically march in unison, all while I gazed at the sliver of sky that seemed to be pressed tightly in between the skyscrapers. I kept on walking and staring at the sky, and I began to notice the skyscrapers becoming larger and larger, and before I knew it, I had to turn to get to my building, and of course, the automat.” - Cristina Martin
66. “Use your intuition. Picture how things happen, why they happen. Don’t stick rigidly to first impressions, and once you’ve read the rule book, throw it away. Better still, burn the bastard.” - Andrew Barrett
67. “I put it to the great man [Hitchcock], the key to fictitious terror is partition or containment: so long as the Bates Motel is sealed off from our world, we want to peer in, like at a scorpion enclosure. But a film that shows the world is a Bates Motel, well, that's... the stuff of Buchloe, dystopia, depression. We'll dip our toes in a predatory, amoral, godless unive3rse, but only our toes.” - David Mitchell
68. “Yes, I am finally a match for Amy. The other morning I woke up next to her, and I studied the back of her skull. I tried to read her thoughts. For once I didn't feel like I was staring into the sun. I'm rising to my wife's level of madness. Because I can feel her changing me again: I was a callow boy, and then a man, good and bad. Now at last I'm the hero. I am the one to root for in the never-ending war story of our marriage. It's a story I can live with. Hell, at this point, I can't imagine my story without Amy. She is my forever antagonist.We are one long frightening climax.” - Gillian Flynn
69. “Life's nycer when it's Naughtie!” - Naughtie Scribe
70. “Oh dios mio, she makes me burn, she makes me need. She is etching herself into mi alma” - P.T. Macias
71. “The lights flickered, the pain went away, and her mother was holding her, singing ‘Sleep sweet sleep’. (The Children of Ankh series) Kim Cormack” - Kim Cormack
72. “We thought we were invincible and Dominic proved us all wrong,” - Jesse Carlisle” - Nina D'Angelo
73. “I needed to know, Jesse. I needed to get inside his head. To find this son of a bitch, I need to get inside his head.” - Stephanie Carovella” - Nina D'Angelo
74. “Her eyes narrowing, she turned her attention back to where Stephanie stood with Ben, feeling her own pain turn to intense fury. “Dominic knew her so damn well because he was usually thinking the same thing. She was his female version – two halves fitting perfectly together,” Gena spat out, anger inflected in her voice. “Like him, she’s reckless and like him, once she gets something into her head nothing or no one will change her mind.” Her fury revealed itself in her eyes, as she spat out, “And, like him, she’s going to get herself killed.” - Gena Evans, Nowhere to Run” - Nina D'Angelo
75. “Wisdom Is The Principal Thing” - kayode Infomart
76. “The terror is trapped inside of him and paralyzes him. He closes his eyes again and tries to drown out the scream - but it keeps ringing and ringing and ringing in his ears.” - Suneeta Misra
77. “I had a quack in the floor. So, I had to use ductile.” - Andrew Sturm
78. “No matter how you twist and turn, your ass is always in the back.” - Andrew Sturm
79. “I was murdered. Even though my heart continued to beat, I was very much deceased. All faded to black” - M.C. Webb
80. “A voice flat enough to fit under a door crack.” - Harlan Coben
81. “Dawn cackles as she guides me through the all-glass porch. Thinner, paler Reina shuffles about behind Dawn, watching as I slip my boots off. Although she tries to hide her hands, her fingers flicker nervously. I place my boots neatly on the floor of the porch beside the other pairs in the shadows under the coats. Music drifts through to us from a distant room – it’s the Beach Boys’ California Dreamin’. Dawn looks at me and I smile – they’ve put the record on for me. Dawn nods along happily. ‘Hear you’re a surfer boy!’ she says and she mimics riding a wave.” - Amaya Ellman
82. “Have a smile on your face for everyone you meet, and a plan to kill them.” - Brad Thor
83. “ I knew then that I would devote every minute we had left together to making her happy, to repairing the pain I had caused her and returning to her what I never known how to give her. These pages will be our memory until she drows her last breath in my arms and I take her forever and escape at last to a place where neither heaven nor hell will ever be able to find us. ” - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
84. “Out in the field, any connection with home just makes you weaker. It reminds you that you were once civilized, soft; and that can get you killed faster than a bullet through the head.” - Henry Mosquera
85. “You know when I told you the joke about how a friend will help you move, but a real friend will help you move a body? I was only kidding.” - Brad Thor
86. “Nothing is ‘wrong’ with me, Dan. What’s wrong with you? she said in the same eerily quiet voice, dark eyes fixated on Dan, as she breathed heavily.” - Martin Hopkins
87. “The slick concrete reflected the facades of the work weary - grey, cracked and old,but more importantly, trodden upon.” - Martin Hopkins
88. “Join us. Play the game. It will bring you an untold number of rewards and you will finally have some direction and purpose in your lives. Take control of yourselves and those around you. Bend them to your will and all worldly pleasures will be yours...” - Martin Hopkins
89. “Either I’ve got a wart on my nose they find curious, or I’ve grown a tail, Albie Merani muttered to himself. Just then he thought. I’d better get a move on, got work to do. He hurried across to some stairs, heading down deeper into station, then followed the signs to the pod station.” - Rw Rivers
90. “If he's like any other man I've ever met, it's not my smile he's going to be looking at.” - Brad Thor
91. “Snowmageddon.Dirty glacial clouds hammered the city's anvil. On the District of Columbia’s northwestern edge, gusts of snow rolled across the Park Road Bridge like volcanic ash.” - Simon Conway
92. “الترويض و التحكم كمثل تجربة عبور الطريق، يجب عليك المشي قليلاً لمنطقة الاختناق حتى تستطيع العبور سريعاً و سالماً؛ فالاختناق يولّد التباطؤ، و التباطؤ يولّد رؤية أوضح و حلول أكثر، و اختيارات أدق و أبرح..” - أنور هاني
93. “A soft mist blew around them. Raindrops glistened in his hair, shimmering under the pale glow of the light post. His eyes were shadowed beneath wispy fringes, but the silver in them glinted like pools of liquid mercury. Her breath caught. It must have made a sound because his fingers tightened. His shaky exhale whispered across her face.“This,” he whispered so quietly she almost didn’t hear him. “Is why you are so bad for me.” - Airicka Phoenix
94. “Redemption is for the weak. The strong keep sinning” - Marvin Amazon
95. “Annabelle, I'm going to kill you!" I cried, frowning at the mess. Then I glanced down the stairway and gasped.It looked like someone had beaten me to it.” - Cleo Coyle
96. “My Ancestor Series of adventure-thrillers run like a raging river. I'm now in the editing process with my next thriller, "The Apothecary." Please go to my website for excerpts, synopses, and book trailers of all my works: http://www.gracepublisihing.org.” - Marshall Chamberlain
97. “There is a moment of sheer panic when I realize that Paul's apartment overlooks the park... and is obviously more expensive than mine.” - Patrick Bateman
98. “It’s still all “ifs” “buts” and “maybes”.’ ‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘But if what I’m saying is correct …” - Terry Murphy
99. “The reflex of fear was soon replaced with another, more useful emotion.Rage.” - Tara Moss
100. “I’m getting the feeling that you two don’t like me. - Kristy” - Matthew Leeth
101. “I’ve been thinking that you, me and Kristy should all have a sleepover or something like that. Wouldn‘t that be so cool! - Carol” - Matthew Leeth
102. “Kenapa mereka suka sekali mencari kepuasan yang bersumber dari objek lain? Kenapa tidak mencari kepusaan dalam dirinya sendiri?” - Evi Sri Rezeki
103. “Meskipun terbiasa tidak diacuhkan, ketika guru diam saja, kemana aku bisa berlindung?” - Evi Sri Rezeki
104. “Mengapa ketika manusia diberi sedikit kekuasaan, dia akan mempergunakan lebih dari seharusnya?” - Evi Sri Rezeki
105. “It’s…The only way I can get on with my life is by forgetting what went on before. Dave used to tell me that I didn’t have control over what the bastard of my father did to me, and that he’d been punished for it, and I might as well concentrate on the rest of my life, because over that…I had some control and I could decide what to do. I could change it over; I could become anything I wanted if I just tried hard enough.” - Olga Núñez Miret
106. “I thought part of the idea of having therapy was putting one in touch with his or her feelings. And don’t give me all that about transference, and counter-transference and all that. I know what I feel. And it has nothing to do with all that. And you also feel for me. And if you don’t know that, then maybe it’s you who needs to have therapy to gain a better knowledge of yourself.” - Olga Núñez Miret
107. “A Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, once said: ‘Dijiste media verdad. Dirán que mientes dos veces si dices la otra mitad.’”“Translated means…”“You told a half-truth. They’ll say you lie twice when you tell the other half.” - Olga Núñez Miret
108. “Jill, a comprehensive school teacher in her early thirties, has put her dark past behind her to become a lady in control of her own life. Successful in her career, soon to be divorced and with no emotional ties, she is content. Except that one morning, while trying to find work for a recalcitrant Year 9 class, she finds herself in a dark and murky street in Victorian England. The image soon disappears and she is back in the classroom, but the children she was teaching have gone and so has an hour of her life. Soon Jill finds herself living two parallel lives, one as a teacher and the other as a Victorian governess. And this is just the beginning” - Jan Hunter
109. “THERE WAS ALWAYS a boy in your life that common sense and the prayers of parents told you to stay away from: fast talker, fast car, and fast hands. He was the boy your father kept a loaded shotgun by the door for and met on the front porch if he ever thought about venturing onto his property…let alone the threshold. He was the tall, dark, mysteriously handsome, and uncharacter-istically quiet one that made you wonder what was going on in his head, and that little voice in your head said it wasn’t always so honorable. He was the boy you broke all of the rules over because bad-boys equaled excitement and the rebel in you liked the ride.” - A.J. Lape
110. “As a writer, I will go down any dark alley, inch my way through the tightest crawl space, and feed on your every fear. I will take your sense of calm and tear it to shreds. - Horror Author Barbara Watkins” - Barbara Watkins
111. “Jesus honey, your husband ain’t dead, he’s in hiding.” He growled, watching her visibly flinch. - Jase Devlin” - Nina D'Angelo
112. “Your eyes betray a sadness that only a worthy man can conjure, but never solve” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
113. “I appreciate the gesture, but you don't have to undress in order to apologize” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
114. “.... does a fair trial necessarily amount to a fair outcome?” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
115. “Abel Muranda fought off furious red ants with mandibles that could cut through a miser's padlock.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
116. “Never is a man more proud than when he shuffles paper in front of an illiterate person.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
117. “Professor, when people say such things after impossibility smacks them in the face, we call it denial” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
118. “... the poor always live on debt. At this point, time is the only thing I still have the credibility to borrow.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
119. “Further north, I met a Siberian hermit who lived in the foothills of the Ural Mountains. His life’s passion was wrestling black bears ... in the nude (him not the bears). He did not know why he did it. All the hermit knew was that if he stopped wrestling bears, he would die.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
120. “The plant and animal kingdoms (excluding humans) offered some pleasant surprises. Organisms from these realms are much simpler to figure out. Their behaviours are not muddied by personality factors or flawed belief systems. If an insect smells like a fart, you can be sure that the stench has a genetic basis. It is neither trying to make a lofty point, nor is it suffering from an inferiority complex.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
121. “The funnel of my family’s salvation must continue narrowing towards the gallows. That journey cannot begin at the parted tips of another woman’s toes” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
122. “You keep distracting from the main point, Vaida. I did not come to Harare to study other people’s scars. I have my own to worry about. They make me sick. I will never recover from the events that carved them into my body. You should focus on healing yours instead of creating new ones.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
123. “Being a hangman requires you to take someone else’s life based on someone else’s judgment, and carry it out on someone else’s schedule. The job does not provide the same satisfaction that an ordinary murderer gets from smashing a skull. It robs them of the fulfillment of plunging a knife into someone’s throat. In the world of capital punishment, the prisoner’s crimes have been sanitized by years of sitting on death row. By then, the execution is a cold and impersonal affair. There is prayer, a noose, and a few last words. The prisoner then experiences a sudden rush of blood to the head. At the end of it all, you have a broken neck and a dead body swinging from the end of a rope. That is it. You don’t get to manhandle them with your own hands. That’s why the brutes you mention will never be hired. So you see, Vaida, this is not a job for a murderer. It is a job for a humanitarian.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
124. “Every successful mission requires a clear plan. Tonight, Mrs. Sibanda’s mission was to enjoy some gratification. She would not be denied. Her plan was as clear as oxygen. It involved an expensive perfume, a bottle of wine, and audacious underwear. Yes, for such battles, lingerie was always a critical component of the offensive strategy.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
125. “I will not mince words. There’s been enough mincing for one day. Therefore, I shall ask my question bluntly: How does a man know that his body has been turned inside out? … His eyes can see the back of his skull with an alarming clarity. I am told it hurts like hell. Especially when he refuses to explain why he has been investigating the hangman’s replacement” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
126. “MUSHAKABVU, I may be in a tough spot, but I am more worried about you. I have never experienced anything close to a sense of kinship with any of my clients, let alone those I have never met. However, the world you sent me to investigate has inspired a selfless concern that is uncommon between strangers. I hope you are just a curious, distant observer in the affairs I have been probing ... But something tells me this hope was frustrated long before our acquaintance.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
127. “One candidate who considered applying for the position explained his change of heart: “That job is like unprotected sex. It feels amazing at the time, but there is a good chance you will pay for it later. None of the benefits are worth the pleasure.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
128. “... the successful recruit must be empathetic. This condition rules out the sadistic, the vengeful, and the enthusiastic. Therefore, many of the garden-variety killers who applied so far have had no chance of success, especially those who are already behind bars.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
129. “... the only difference between carnivores and plants is that the latter eat meat through ‘translator’ organisms. Maggots and bacteria ‘pre-chew’ dead animal matter, which plants then absorb as nutrients. So if eating pre-chewed food does not change the fact that a baby is human, why should a plant be any less of a carnivore because it out-sources the digestion of animal protein to organisms of decay?” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
130. “The girl had a special way of saying “anything”. The gods had blessed her voice with a special monopoly. It delivered an acoustic chocolate that was laced with all flavours of euphoria. The substance led to surges in testosterone in all types of men, including the average botanist. “Anything.” The way she handled the word endowed it with so many possibilities. Professor Khupe decided to investigate how many of these Ketiwe would let him explore. To his delight the parameters of the word had proven to be quite elastic.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
131. “Mr. Gweta and his daughter were the cosmetics camouflaging an infected blackhead. The rest of the ugliness ran deep into a world where plants ate people and botanists lay at the bottom of the food chain.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
132. “Professor Khupe rubbed his hand along the sand dunes of her windswept form. The static charge made her skin feel like the surface of a cactus. He recoiled. How he wished he had gone into the priesthood when he had had the chance. Embracing celibacy was far easier than battling the consequences of shunning it.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
133. “As he was about to press the button to shut the doors, a young woman stepped in. She had that sort of beauty that deserved to be prosecuted for appearing without notice. Professor Khupe was confident that an appropriate law existed for such a purpose. However, no prosecutor could remain undistracted for long enough to find the said law in the criminal code. The young lady would enjoy a life of impunity.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
134. “Professor Khupe felt his chest swell with pride. It was doing so without his encouragement. If an electrical fault had stopped the elevator from rising, his inflating ego would have powered the remainder of their journey to the twenty-second floor.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
135. “Mr. Gweta looked ten years younger than Professor Khupe had expected. His jet-black hair was trimmed so neatly that it would make a manicured golf course look scruffy. His face was exceptionally smooth, giving the impression that he had been born without skin pores and transitioned through puberty devoid of any facial hair to pockmark his countenance. Mr. Gweta’s face was perfectly symmetrical. An ant walking from one side to the other would experience a serious case of déjà vu.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
136. “Despite his elegant appearance, Mr. Gweta’s most striking asset was his alluring personality. Professor Khupe had met few such men in his life. Their warmth made everyone feel like they were their best friend. They were good men. However, they tended to be morally ambidextrous. If a stranger confessed to having been involved in a horrible crime, they would reserve judgment until they found out whether the confessor was the victim or victimizer. Once they knew, they would immediately lend their sympathies to the confessor’s position. Their worldview was simple. They supported the first person to confide in them. Such men made good lawyers.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
137. “... cynicism is the only tool that can scrape away the tint off rose-coloured glasses.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
138. “I tell you, Professor, growing up is a full contact sport. Somewhere in our brains, foolishness and naïveté join forces with a false sense of invincibility. Together, they score own-goals against their host’s interests. All this happens while that referee known as ‘reason’ is collapsed in a drunken stupor, unable to stop the madness. When he finally wakes up, all he can do is grant the useless penalty known as ‘hindsight’. But the outcome remains unchanged. The game is lost …” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
139. “Not all diseases come from bacteria and viruses, Professor. The worst often come from things you cannot see under a microscope. This plant is infested with an aggressive strain of such invisible germs.” - Taona Dumisani Chiveneko
140. “What is a monster? Something that grows hair all over and howls? Could be. But the real monster is within, and when it comes out, it’s as fugly as you see it, or as it lets you see it.” - John Vamvas Olga Montes
141. “It is. And yet so few really are free. Nearly all people live in prisons of their own making, regardless of their faith, creed, sex or race.” - Ted Dekker
142. “Pape called Basil his sanctuary. In truth we all exist in our own sanctuaries-but I don't mean cathedrals or prisons. I'm talking about our hearts and minds, which imprison us in anxiety, dear, insecurity, anger and other forms of misery. The walls & bars that keep most in a constant state of suffering are thoughts and emotions, not concrete & steel. It's a disease. Insanity. Most are afflicted by it, regardless of which side of the law they find themselves on or where they lay their heads at night. To be free of this, Renee, is to be free indeed.” - Ted Dekker
143. “To write well is to have felt a tingle of joy in your being; to have left a little of your blood on the page' B.J.Kibble, author of DRY RAIN, LEGION, CHASING THE WIND,and CRIES FROM THE GRAVE.” - B.J. Kibble
144. “Yes, 1960’s North American sitcoms have led me to study the United States 1920’s and 1930’s crime bosses— QET Jenkins” - Kim Welsman
145. “So? I know damn well that I didn’t poison her.”Veronica Lane, M.D., Treating Murder” - Gabrielle Black
146. “I let one of the men rename me. A man gave me the name Rose – you didn’t know that, did you, Poke?…He said, this man, he said that Kwan was too hard to remember, even though it’s a good name and it means ‘spirit,’ and that the rose was the queen of flowers and I was the queen of Patpong.” She laughs, rough as a cough. “The queen of Patpong. A kingdom of whores and viruses. Death with a smile.” - Timothy Hallinan
