Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen Quotes

“Everybody has it wrong way round. Parents don't make children--children make parents. They shape our behavior from the first wail. Mold us into what they need. It can be a pretty rough process, too”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen

“Hey, let’s try speed-starting the fire with an infusion of pure oxygen!” Because inside every senior tech officer was a junior tech officer who’d been on a short leash for a long time.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“When your young life offered its first disaster, naturally it loomed large. After you’d survived dozens, you basically just told the next one to take a number and get in line.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“Miles, when he was contemplating this technology for my future grandchildren, wanted to start twelve at once and do them all in one efficient batch. Like growing his own platoon, I gather. I offered to take turns with Ekaterin holding his head under water till he had a better idea, but as it turned out, she didn't need my help. Wonderful girl, my daughter-in-law. I still don't know what he did to deserve her.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen

“What’s in the box? Not a severed head—again—I trust?” It seemed too small for that, fortunately. Cordelia’s gray eyes glinted. “Now, now, Oliver. Bring home one dismembered body part, once, mind you, once, and people get twitchy about checking your luggage ever after.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“Truth is always War’s first victim, the old saying went.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“It could be surprisingly hard to counter Plain Stupid. Even by heroic measures.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“And then his world turned into a pelting rain of flaming snot.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen

“She considered the familiar conundrum inherent in complimenting a child for doing something well in the course of what ought not to have been done at all, and kept her peace.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“I will tell you, parenting is a team sport. You need backup, reserves.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“he’d looked as tall and cool as ever, but a faint panicked light in his blue eyes had put her oddly in mind of a cat that had just had an inadvertent ride in a dryer.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“inside every senior tech officer was a junior tech officer who’d been on a short leash for a long time.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“the Barrayaran officer corps favored heterosexual marital stability in its senior members mainly to cut down on the potential for ambient personal dramas slopping over into work, as they tended to do.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“Ah.” “And what does ah mean?” he asked, slightly exasperated. “It’s sort of like biting my tongue, but less painful.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“Everybody has it wrong way round. Parents don’t make children—children make parents. They shape our behavior from the first wail. Mold us into what they need. It can be a pretty rough process, too.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“Her lips curved up despite themselves at the memory of Oliver in the crystal canoe, gazing as entranced as a boy at his newly discovered underwater Sergyar.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“If she finished her work—hah, now there was a fantasy, this work would never be finished, only abandoned, or, all right, passed on—she might squeeze out another day off by next weekend.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“As had she, she supposed, but given that she was Aral’s wife, very few men who weren’t obviously insane had ever bothered her with unwanted advances. Although her own social obliviousness had doubtless also helped smooth things over.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“If you think safety is expensive, try pricing an accident, as the sign says.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“What do you most want for your birthday picnic, Admiral?” Taken by surprise, he answered honestly: “No casualties.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“In fifteen years, all those disturbing biological blobs would be out on Kareenburg’s streets, wearing strange fashions, listening to annoying music, and disagreeing politically with their beleaguered parents.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“What is love but delight in another human being? He delights me daily.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“So, how long has my mother had this questionable fetish for bisexual Barrayaran admirals? I don’t think even the Betans have earrings for that one.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“One expected the advent of children to rearrange one’s future. No one had told Jole that they could also rearrange one’s past. It seemed an extraordinary reach to have,”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“Surrounded by them all, she was reminded of the old parental curse—May you have six children just like you. Except that this curse seemed to have gone awry. Miles would have reveled at six children just like himself; he’d have known exactly what to do. Instead, he seemed to have received six children, none in the least like himself, and furthermore, each one different from all the others. As parental revenges went, this was actually much better.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“Although upon reflection, Jole wasn’t sure of the advisability of introducing a keen young officer to Vorkosigan notions of initiative. Metaphors about fighting fire with gasoline rose to his mind.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“...she had switched from counting her years not up from birth, but back from death—a grab-bag of time not growing, but shrinking, use it or lose it.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen

“I’d think you were in an excellent position to intimidate suitors.” “But everyone knows I’m not allowed to use the plasma cannons for personal purposes.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga

“I’d always thought the very worst thing one could do was say or repeat anything that one hadn’t made sure was true. People’s lives could depend on one’s accuracy. To me, the rumor mill seemed not just cruel, but deranged.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen

“Parents don’t make children—children make parents. They shape our behavior from the first wail. Mold us into what they need. It can be a pretty rough process, too.”
― Lois McMaster Bujold, Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen (Vorkosigan Saga