Game of Snipers Quotes

“University, where she is an adjunct professor of education and serves on the Veterans Committee, among about a thousand other things. That’s heroism. I have taken the kernel of her story and do what I do, which is dramatize, romanticize, exaggerate, and open fire. Hence, Game of Snipers. Now, on to apologies, excuses, and evasions. Let me offer the first to Tel Aviv; Dearborn, Michigan; Greenville, Ohio; Wichita, Kansas; Rock Springs, Wyoming; and Anacostia, D.C. I generally go to places I write about to check the lay of streets, the fall of shadows, the color of police cars, and the taste of local beer. At seventy-three, such ordeals-by-airport are no longer fun, not even the beer part; I only go where there’s beaches. For this book, I worked from maps and Google, and any geographical mistakes emerge out of that practice. Is the cathedral three hundred yards from the courthouse in Wichita? Hmm, seems about right, and that’s good enough for me on this. On the other hand, I finally got Bob’s wife’s name correct. It’s Julie, right? I’ve called her Jen more than once, but I’m pretty sure Jen was Bud Pewtie’s wife in Dirty White Boys. For some reason, this mistake seemed to trigger certain Amazon reviewers into psychotic episodes. Folks, calm down, have a drink, hug someone soft. It’ll be all right. As for the shooting, my account of the difficulties of hitting at over a mile is more or less accurate (snipers have done it at least eight times). I have simplified, because it is so arcane it would put all but the most dedicated in a coma. I have also been quite accurate about the ballistics app FirstShot, because I made it up and can make it do anything I want. The other shot, the three hundred, benefits from the wisdom of Craig Boddington, the great hunter and writer, who looked it over and sent me a detailed email, from which I have borrowed much. Naturally, any errors are mine, not Craig’s. I met Craig when shooting something (on film!) for another boon companion, Michael Bane, and his Outdoor Channel Gun Stories crew. For some reason, he finds it amusing when I start jabbering away and likes to turn the camera on. Don’t ask me why. On the same trip, I also met the great firearms historian and all-around movie guy (he knows more than I do) Garry James, who has become”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers

“It was a cheesy suite motel near the airport, off the interstate. Left-hand neighbor: strip bar; right -hand neighbor: Best Tacos in Texas, which was true except for all the other places in Texas that sold tacos.”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers

“Suppose you go to the police with fears that a number of homeless men have disappeared? What sort of response would that generate?” Silence, of course, for the Israeli had focused on a particular weakness in American society, one that no one seemed to have the knowledge, the will, or the funding to do much about.”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers

“If you make an assumption, we’re in a world of confirmation bias, and clarity is the first casualty.”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers

“Nothing is known these days. All fact is conditional. Modern media allows any interested party to influence millions of people. Who brays the loudest or frames the most skillfully or feeds prejudices the most earnestly is the most believed. False news—particularly if it is backed with credible journalistic sources, as uncovered by reporters who believe they’re doing God’s work. We will be telling another version of a story, and who’s to say ours is better than theirs?”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers

“Okay,” he said, “we have a date. We also have politics, ego, vanity, media manipulation, and personal enmity in the mix. In other words, any day in D.C. since 1784.”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers

“nobody really looks at them, American legalism is such that they can’t be rounded up in a tank or beaten until they leave town.”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers

“Where could he get living bodies to hit at long range? It’s not the sort of thing you advertise for, nobody’s going to volunteer for it, not even for a large sum to be left to the volunteers’ benefactors.”
― Stephen Hunter, Game of Snipers