The Chain Quotes

“George Orwell was wrong, she thinks. In the future, it won’t be the state that keeps tabs on everyone by extensive use of surveillance; it will be the people. They’ll do the state’s work for it by constantly uploading their locations, interests, food preferences, restaurant choices, political ideas, and hobbies to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other social media sites. We are our own secret police.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“A true predator sometimes kills even when it isn’t hungry.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“The darkness keeps its own counsel.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“A man once told me that all books should end at chapter seventy-seven.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Life is fragile, fleeting and precious.
And to live at all is miracle enough.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Life is a cascade of nows falling on top of one another without meaning or purpose. Of all the philosophers, only Schopenhauer ever got that right.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Chemo is a little death that you invite in in order to keep the big death waiting outside on the porch.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“They have all sipped from the Drink Me bottle. They have all unwound the clew of red thread. They have all fallen through the looking glass.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Fear is coursing through her, but fear is a liberation too. Fear releases power and is the precursor to action.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Ideally, the business and the personal should never mix, but with human beings there’s always going to be some blurring of the lines.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“It only takes two facing mirrors to construct a labyrinth. Jorge Luis Borges, Seven Nights”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Recall that one builds a labyrinth not to hide but to lie in wait.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Rachel shivers with a mixture of fascination and revulsion. How can she think about this sort of thing so glibly? Is that what trauma does to you?”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“We’re all riding on our bubbles, she thinks, we’re all waiting for the blessèd break.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“As J. G. Ballard pointed out, civilization is just a thin, fragile veneer over the law of the jungle: Better you than me. Better your kid than my kid.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Number one: you are not the first and you will certainly not be the last. Number two: remember, it’s not about the money—it’s about The Chain.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“If I don’t make it, don’t let them cast some asshole to play me in the movie version of this,”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“You know what they say. The living are only a species of the dead,”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“She remembers Voltaire’s warning about the perfect being the enemy of the good.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“no conspiracy can survive exponential growth.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“You know what they say. The living are only a species of the dead, aren’t they? And a very rare species at that. The cradle rocks over the abyss.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“She looks at her hastily scrawled, extremely incriminating checklist. 1. Ransom 2. Burner phones 3. Research target/ victim 4. Get gun, rope, duct tape, etc. 5. Research place to hide victim”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“A tradition is a living argument. A living argument for a practice that began a long time ago.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“As the party continues well past the kids’ bedtimes, Oliver is informed that the Jets and the Giants both suck but the Giants suck more because they’re in the same division as the Redskins.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“A family has just finished moving into a house in Bethesda, Maryland.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“We’re going to call you Ginger.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Action is bad. Inaction is bad. It is a classic zugzwang situation. You have parachuted into the minefield and there is no safe way out.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Every child of a parent is a hostage to fortune, but not every parent has been reminded so vividly.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“Having a child instantly turns you into a grownup.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain

“There are a breathtaking number of people whose profiles and posts are public and can be viewed by anyone. George Orwell was wrong, she thinks. In the future, it won’t be the state that keeps tabs on everyone by extensive use of surveillance; it will be the people. They’ll do the state’s work for it by constantly uploading their locations, interests, food preferences, restaurant choices, political ideas, and hobbies to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other social media sites. We are our own secret police.”
― Adrian McKinty, The Chain