The Mercy of Gods (The Captive's War #1)

by James S.A. Corey

Normal people would succeed where she couldn’t because she’d been born a little broken. But there was also a world outside her head that was filled with mystery and exploration and unexpected things to discover.

If there was a war coming, it would find them gardening.

He could dream of perfection without being fettered by it. He desired peace and destroyed countless worlds to take it. He held both these ideas in his mind at the same time, and instead of this dissonance ripping him apart, it made him powerful. If we had known that before it was too late we would have killed him.

First times always expanded the experience of the space for him. Going back was faster, the distance shorter, because it was known.

She wasn’t suicidal, she was just taking comfort in the idea that no matter what, she wasn’t here forever.

Life went on. That was the terrible thing. They were ripped out of their world, their lives, their sense of who and what they were. Their history. They were killed, or made to watch the people they loved die. And then, at some point, they were hungry. Thirsty. They had to piss. Someone told a joke, and they laughed, however darkly. They washed dishes. Changed clothes. Held funerals. It felt like it should have stopped, all of it, and it didn’t. The slow, low pulse of being alive kept making its demands, no matter what. However bad it was, however mind-breaking and strange and painful, the mundane insisted on its cut.

But what we still are, we still are, and if I were not pleased by that, I would not be anything at all.

what humans can become when they face the universe and refuse to look away.