John > John's Quotes

“Books have the power to create, destroy or change civilizations.”
― Zaman Ali, HUMANITY Understanding Reality and Inquiring Good

“It is not enough to win a war; it is more important to organize the peace.”
― Aristotle

“Each thinking mind is a political mind.”
― Zaman Ali, HUMANITY Understanding Reality and Inquiring Good

“All the motives for murder are covered by four Ls: Love, Lust, Lucre and Loathing.”
― P.D. James, The Murder Room

“In each of us is a hidden child. It’s nice when the child wakes up because the world of imagination is a tremendous place to play.”
― Stjepan Varesevac Cobets, Magic Clogs

“Justice is not natural among people, but the struggle for justice is the most noble act in society. Because justice may not be possible, but as it’s the way toward the desired society for each one to live in, that’s why its struggle is noble and regard as the highest act.”
― Zaman Ali, GOVERNMENT Servant, Not Master

“When I write a book I first have an idea, a blank piece of paper in front of me and I have no idea where it will take me when I start writing. Sometimes I surprise myself where my writing takes me.”
― Stjepan Varesevac Cobets

“We're free agents. We can do what we want." Free agents. When my mother used those words she'd wave her keys. "We're like two bachelorettes," she'd say as we backed out of the drive. The road she took was always by the sea. Floods never put her off. "It'll pass" she'd say when I braced myself in the seat. If a wave hit the car, she'd drive on, floating sometimes for seconds. The wipers could clear off the sand and small stones. Seaweed was the problem. Not the one with poppers. That landed with a thud and rolled like a body off the windscreens. No, the problem was the smaller stuff, bright green and fine that wrapped itself like a feather boa around the side mirror. Usually, with one hand, she could throw it off. But sometimes, it took both her hands as if it were a scarf around Isadora Duncan's neck.”
― Georgia Scott, American Girl: Memories That Made Me

“My wife was among the millions who died, and I was still there, wrapped in a cloud of self-pity. I couldn’t hold her hand and say how much I loved her in those last moments.”
― Stjepan Varesevac Cobets, 2025: SF Novella

“[Greens] don't come through the back door the same as other groceries. They don't cower at the bottom of paper bags marked 'Liberty.' They wave over the top. They don't stop to be checked off the receipt. They spill out onto the counter. No going onto shelves with cans in orderly lines like school children waiting for recess. No waiting, sometimes for years beyond the blue sell by date, to be picked up and taken from the shelf. Greens don't stack or stand at attention. They aren't peas to be pushed around. Cans can't contain them. Boxed in they would burst free. Greens are wild. Plunging them into a pot took some doing. Only lobsters fight more. Either way, you have to use your hands. Then, retrieving them requires the longest of my mother's wooden spoons, the one with the burnt end. Swept onto a plate like the seaweed after a storm, greens sit tall, dark, and proud.”
― Georgia Scott, American Girl: Memories That Made Me