Phantom Quotes

“But perhaps that's why we take snaps...to provide false evidence to underpin the false claim that we were happy. Because the thought that we weren't happy at least for some time during our lives is unbearable. Adults order children to smile in the photos, involve them in the lie, so we smile, we feign happiness.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“But everything good in this shit world is either by prescription, sold out, or so expensive you have to sell your soul to taste it. Life is a restaurant you can't afford. Death the bill for the food you didn't even have a chance to eat. So you order the most expensive thing on the menu - you're in for it anyway, right? - and if you're lucky, you get a mouthful.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Everyone knew that fat had become the new cancer, yet they bellyached about the dieting hysteria and applauded the "real" women's body. As though doing no exercise and being overfed was some kind of sensible mold.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Are you dying?"
Cato lit his cigarette. "It's not acute, perhaps, but we're all dying, Harry.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Let me say here and now that faith has never done me any good, only doubt. So that is what has become my testament.”
― Jo Nesbø , Phantom

“A rat is neither good nor evil. It does what a rat has to do.”
― Jo Nesbø , Phantom

“Life owes you, but sometimes you have to be your own fucking debt collector. And if we have to burn in hell for it, heaven's going to be sparsely populated.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Well, it is in fact possible to put things behind you, Rakel. The art of dealing with ghosts is to dare to look at them long and hard until you know that is what they are. Ghosts. Lifeless, powerless ghosts.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“And I didn’t want you to expose me as a deserter, someone who disappears. But things happened as they did anyway. What I wanted to say was that even if I wasn’t there for you, that doesn’t mean you weren’t important to me. We can’t live the lives we would like to. We’re prisoners of … things. Of who we are.” Oleg lifted his chin. “Of junk and shit.” “That, too.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Life owes you, but sometimes you have to be your own fucking debt collector.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Jeder läuft in den Fußstapfen derer, die es vor ihm gab.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“—Claro que a lo mejor por eso nos hacemos fotos —continuó Harry—. Para obtener pruebas falsas con las que poder fundamentar la afirmación falsa de que éramos felices. Porque pensar que nunca hemos sido felices se nos hace insoportable. Los adultos obligan a los niños a sonreír cuando les hacen fotos, los incluyen en la mentira; por eso sonreímos, fingimos felicidad. Pero Oleg nunca fue capaz de sonreír si no lo sentía, no era capaz de mentir, no tenía ese don.”
― Jo Nesbø, Fantasma

“Ja. Es ist wirklich möglich Dinge hinter sich zu lassen, Rakel. Es kommt bei diesen Gespenstern darauf an, sie lange und intensiv genug anzuschauen, damit man erkennt, dass es bloß Gespenster sind. Das ist die Kunst. Tote, ohnmächtige Trugbilder.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“In any conflict we instinctively take the side of those who look most like us.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“He’d had a plan, a plan for a new life. Now he had twenty minutes to come up with a new one. It was lunacy. He could have been on a plane to Bangkok. But that was the point; he could have been on a plane to Bangkok now. He simply didn’t have the ability—it was a deficiency, an operating fault; his clubfoot was that he had never been able to tell himself he didn’t care, to forget, to clear out. He could drink, but he sobered up. He could go to Hong Kong, but he came back. He was undoubtedly a very damaged person.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“It all fits together, Oleg. A murder is a white whale. A missing person is a white whale. If you’ve seen a white whale twice it’s the same whale. What can you tell me about Dubai?”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“twenty-five had bought drugs because”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Because the thought that we weren’t happy at least for some time during our lives is unbearable. Adults”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Such is the end of the evil-doer: the death of a sinner always reflects his life.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“frightening? Vigdis A. panted”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“A vida é um restaurante que não podemos frequentar. A morte é a conta da refeição que não tivemos sequer oportunidade de provar. Por isso, pedes o repasto mais caro na ementa, também já estás nas lonas, certo, e talvez consigas levar uma garfada à boca. p288”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“She stroked his shoulder, up as far as his neck and back again. Over his chest. And he thought she must be able to feel his heart beating and that she was like the Pioneer TV they had stopped producing because it was too good, and you could see it was good because the black part of the picture was so black.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“Nybakk’s shotgun in Oppsal was the easier option. Furthermore, a shotgun gave him more room to maneuver. To retrieve the rifle”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“change of scene. A new start. And it worked.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom

“you.”
― Jo Nesbø, Phantom