Dread Nation (Dread Nation, #1)

by Justina Ireland

But that’s the way life goes most of the time: the thing you least count on comes along and ruins everything else you got planned. I figure it’s much better to just be all-around prepared, since the best defense is a good offense.

Everyone knows that academics are the most ruthless cutthroats around.

One: the dead will take everything you love. You have to end them before they can end you. That’s exactly what I aim to do. And two: the person poking the dead ain’t always the one paying for it. In fact, most times, it’s the ones minding their own business who suffer.

“Sometimes you have to live down to people’s expectations, Kate. If you can do that, you’ll get much further in life.

That last bit is a lie, but the easiest lie to tell is the one people want to believe. Even though a man is being devoured onstage, they’re still more worried about their own hides. They begin to file out quickly but much more calmly, the professor all but forgotten. It’s a cruel, cruel world. And the people are the worst part.

There’s nothing white folks hate more than realizing they accidentally treated a Negro like a person.

“See, the problem in this world ain’t sinners, or even the dead. It is men who will step on anyone who stands in the way of their pursuit of power. Luckily there will always be people like me to stop them.”