Split Second Quotes

“This was contrasted with a scene in which two prissy, high-IQ professionals were discussing having children. They both agreed that having children was an important decision and that they needed to wait for the right time, since child bearing wasn’t something that should be rushed into. Ultimately, they died childless. The moral: the dimwitted and impulsive might not be able to hold a job or learn algebra, but they sure knew how to screw each other—and reproduce like crazy.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Why? For lack of anything else to do with their time. Because they were impulsive and not bright enough to even understand the importance of birth control. And because the more kids they had, the bigger the welfare checks and food stamp handouts they received.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Technology . . . is a queer thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other.” ​—Carrie Snow”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“The universe would rather live with paradox than infinite timelines,”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Blake set his phone to speaker, audio-only, and had Myla tie it into the microphone and sound system of the motel’s television set. This way, he and Jenna could speak normally in the direction of the television and their voices would be picked up easily, and all three in the room could hear and see audio or video coming from whoever answered.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“played across her face. “It’s like that famous quote, ‘If I would have had more time, I’d have written you a shorter letter.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Through space-time, yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. When you’re not moving at all in space, you’re moving at the speed of light, so to speak, through time—the fastest the universe allows you to do so. When you’re moving at the speed of light through space, you stop moving through time.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“the new incoming phone has to be”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Jenna carefully removed the tiny stick, roughly the size of her thumb, not surprisingly, since these storage units were also commonly referred to as thumb drives. These devices could have been downsized further, but the tinier an object the easier it was to lose, so this size had become fairly standard.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“The need for sleep could be a terrible burden, but she was glad sleep existed. If it didn’t, one would never get any real downtime. This way, no matter what happened the night before, you could wake up and feel like you had a new lease on life, a clean slate, that a chapter had ended and a new one had begun.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Absolutely. Dash and Dash have become the best of friends with himselves.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“but with a man whose entire body was paralyzed. Well, all except for his penis, which enabled them to have three children, although the thought picture of how this was accomplished wasn’t something on which she liked to dwell.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Don’t get me wrong,” continued Jenna, “I have nothing against people with good working vocabularies. I’d like to think I have one. And sometimes a less common word needs to be used to convey a nuance, or achieve a necessary level of precision. But if something can be said simply, it should be. Using big words isn’t impressive. Getting points across simply, succinctly, but with great clarity is.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“You know, would simply use the word use, rather than utilize the word utilize.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Some people melted under pressure and some reacted to its squeeze by turning into diamond,”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Surely you can tell us something,”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Survival of the fittest”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“He was really beginning to like working with scientists. They were logical and quick on the uptake.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“sometimes a less common word needs to be used to convey a nuance, or achieve a necessary level of precision. But if something can be said simply, it should be. Using big words isn’t impressive. Getting points across simply, succinctly, but with great clarity is.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“If I would have had more time, I’d have written you a shorter letter.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Jenna Morrison kissed her sister, Amber, goodbye, ignoring the shrieks of tiny Sophia, who was swaddled so completely in a baby blanket that her actual presence could not be confirmed by eye, as though she had fallen into a cottony-soft, mint-green black hole.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Time, like gravity, was a barrier thrown up by an unyielding universe. Mankind had always railed against both of these barriers, forever fantasizing about their eventual defeat.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Faraday, Maxwell and the Electromagnetic Field: How Two Men Revolutionized Physics, by Nancy Forbes and Basil Mahon.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“satisfaction. “I’m going to be very busy.” * * * Blake and Wexler traveled to the fifth floor, one of those that was no longer subject to video coverage. The doors opened and a member of security appeared two feet away, facing them as though he had been waiting for the elevator. Blake and the man raised their guns at the exact same time and stopped, both with their weapons now trained point-blank at the other’s head. Neither took their eyes off the other, or even blinked, and both ignored Nathan Wexler completely. “Looks like we have a standoff,” said the man, still staring at Blake with the intensity of a predatory cat. Blake pulled the trigger and the man’s head almost exploded from his shoulders. His body fell to”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Einstein: His Life and Universe, by Walter Isaacson”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“It never ceased to amaze him the power of the sex drive. No matter how intelligent and rational a person was otherwise, the sex drive was controlled by more primitive regions, and could turn the most brilliant man on Earth into an animal, flirting with disaster in pursuit of physical gratification, even when he knew in his rational mind that this was nothing but a trick played on him by his incorrigible limbic system. Walsh”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“If an American soldier was too decent to shoot through these helpless human shields he would die. If he did defend himself and a civilian was killed, this would appear on news programs around the world as yet another example of the cruelty and overzealous nature of the American military, of the barbarity of the American soldier, emphasizing the plight of the poor freedom fighters whose countries they”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“The room fell silent as everyone considered what living under the rule of an unstable genius might be like. “Would”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“Either your couch just gave birth to a litter of throw pillows, or you have a woman living here.”  “You”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second

“He half expected to receive a rocket-propelled suppository at any moment, but none came.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Split Second