The Wolf in Winter Quotes

“He was trying to put loss into words, but loss is absence and will always defy expression.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Misery loved company, but damnation needed it.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Know a man by his metaphors.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“There was a lot to be said for the discipline of married life. It forced one to learn the art of compromise, and to remedy the flaws in one's nature.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“It’s a full-time job being homeless. It’s a full-time job being poor.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Prepare for the worst and you won’t be disappointed.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“It didn’t matter whether a thing existed or not. What mattered was the trouble caused by those who believed in its existence.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Come on,” I said a third time, to the approaching darkness, to the figures that beckoned from within it, to the peace that comes at last to every dead thing.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“The trick was not to stifle the emotions, but to control them. Love, anger, grief – all were weapons in their way, but they needed to be kept in check.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“But there was a saying in Hebrew, “We survived Pharoah, we’ll survive this too.” In the words of the old joke, it was the theme of every Jewish holiday: they tried to kill us, they failed, so let’s eat!”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“If he has a weakness, it’s that he’s a moral being. Where possible, he’ll do the right thing, the just thing, and if he does wrong he’ll bear the guilt of it.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“wanted to talk to them. I wanted to tell them that I was sorry. I wanted to say what every child wishes to say to his parents when they’re gone and it’s too late to say anything at all: that I loved them, and had always loved them.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“He knew there were some who said that those who kept dogs had to resign themselves to their eventual loss because of the animals’ relatively short lives. The trick—if “trick” was the right word—was to learn to love the spirit of the animal, and to recognize that it transferred itself from dog to”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Warraner looked pleasantly surprised at the question, like a Mormon who had suddenly found himself invited into a house for coffee, cake, and a discussion of the wit and wisdom of Joseph Smith.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“daddy
and it contained within it the prospect of living and the hope of dying, of endings and beginnings, of love and loss and peace and rage, all wrapped up in two whispered syllables.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“You pay by the hour, even if the job only takes five minutes. I don’t do fractions.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Warraner would rather have been the king of nothing than the prince of something.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“First the girl, then the detective, now the wolf. The town was starting to unravel.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“If cats could count, they’d start getting nervous around the time they put paid to their fifth life.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“But he was wounded, and tired, and winter was still upon him.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Slow animals always become prey in the end.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“On the other hand, all investigations involve a degree of speculation—the capacity to bear witness to a crime and imagine a chain of events that might have caused that crime to be committed. An investigation was not simply a matter of historical research, as Warraner had suggested. It was an act of faith both in one’s own capacities and in the possibility of justice in a world that had made justice subservient to the rule of law.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Justice is never vague,” said Morland. “The law only makes it seem that way. And as for this man . . .”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Dates were of no consequence.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“faith.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“secretions.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“but loss is absence, and will always defy expression.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Benny's was more of a restaurant than a bar, assuming you were prepared to be generous with your definition of a restaurant ... A menu board on the wall above had adjustable plastic letters and numbers arranged into the kind of prices that hadn't changed since Elvis died, and the kinds of food choices that had helped kill him.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“Every town has someone who is a royal pain in the ass.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter

“But the question that consumed him most was its nature, for he believed that men created gods as much, if not more, than gods created men. If this old god existed, it did so because there were men and women who permitted it to continue to exist through their beliefs. They fed it, and it, in turn, fed them.”
― John Connolly, The Wolf in Winter