Running Blind Quotes

“I'm twenty-nine, yes really, I'm from Aspen, Colorado, I'm six feet one, yes really, I've been at Quantico two years, yes I date guys, no I dress like this just because I like it, no I'm not married, no I don't currently have a boyfriend, and no I don't want to have dinner with you tonight.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“Always love or money. And it can’t be love, because love makes you crazy, and this guy isn’t crazy.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“I can’t worry about something I can’t change.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“People say that knowledge is power. The more knowledge, the more power. Suppose you knew the winning numbers for the lottery? All of them? Not guessed them, not dreamed them, but really knew them? What would you do? You would run to the store, is what. You would mark those numbers on the playslip. And you would win.”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“the open! So go for it! Jump on it! Just gobble it right up! “I don’t know,” he said. “We need to talk about it,” she said. But there was no more talking to be done, not then, because the buzzer from the lobby started up an insistent squawk, like somebody was down there on the street leaning on the button. Jodie stood”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“You ever been to Israel? Women in the front line there too, and I wouldn’t want to put too many U.S. units up against the Israeli defenses, at least not if it was going to be critical who won.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“The plane was on descent. Reacher could feel it in his ears. And he could feel abrupt turns. The pilot was military, so he was using the rudder. Civilian pilots avoid using the rudder. Using the rudder makes the plane slew, like a car skids. Passengers don't like the feeling. So civilian pilots turn by juicing the engines on one side and backing off on the others. Then the plane comes around smoothly. But military pilots don't care about their passengers' comfort. It's not like they've bought tickets.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“Reacher squinted through the glare. They were all looking at him. The sandy guy, Poulton. The woman, Lamarr. The hypertensive, Blake. All three of them from Serial Crimes down in Quantico. Up here to talk to him. Then Deerfield, the New York Bureau chief, a heavyweight. Then the lean guy, Cozo, from Organized Crime, working on the protection rackets. He glanced slowly left to right, and right to left, and finished up back on Deerfield. Then he nodded.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“The problem with getting your rights abused was that somebody had to witness it for it to mean anything. Somebody had to see it happen.”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“But the big reputation was obviously slow to spread. The spare avant-garde decor made it OK to have only twenty tables in a sixty-by-sixty space, but in four weeks he had never seen more than three of them occupied. Once he had been the only customer during the whole ninety-minute span he spent in the place. Tonight there was just one other couple eating, five tables away. They were sitting face to face across from each other, side-on to him. The guy was medium-sized and sandy. Short sandy hair, fair moustache, light brown suit, brown shoes. The woman was thin and dark, in a skirt and a jacket. There was an imitation leather briefcase resting against the table leg next to her right foot. They were both maybe thirty-five and looked tired and worn and slightly dowdy. They were comfortable enough together, but they weren’t talking much.”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“The pilot was military, so he was using the rudder. Civilian pilots avoid using the rudder. Using the rudder makes the plane slew, like a car skids. Passengers don’t like the feeling. So civilian pilots turn by juicing the engines on one side and backing off on the others. Then the plane comes around smoothly.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“I want you to swallow your tongue. I want you to just gulp it down, real sudden, like it was an oyster.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“Not while there are dogs on the street,” he”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“So you put it out of your mind. But it won’t go away. It nags at you. It gets bigger and bigger, louder and louder. You end up sitting all alone, cold and sweating,”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“chair and stepped away from the table and squared his napkin on the tile next to him and started collecting the debris into it. The couple five tables away was watching him. “When are they coming back?” Reacher asked. “An hour,” the guy said. “How much do they want?” The guy shrugged again and smiled a bitter smile. “I get a start-up discount,” he said. “Two hundred a week, goes to four when the place picks up.” “You want to pay?” The guy made another sad face. “I want to stay in business, I guess. But paying out two bills a week ain’t exactly going to help me do that.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“as soon as he walked into the cafeteria.”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“You know what you really want,’ she said. ‘Everybody always does, instinctively. Any doubt you’re feeling is just noise, trying to bury the truth, because you don’t want to face it.”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“What happened to all that conversation before mobiles were invented? Was it all bottled up? Burning ulcers in people’s guts? Or did it just develop spontaneously because technology made it possible?”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“Nobody ever said institutional thinking is rational.”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“she said. “We’ve both got the same problem. You’re getting me caught up in something I don’t want to be caught up in, and I’m getting you caught up in something you don’t want to be caught up in either. The civilized world. The house, the car, living somewhere, doing ordinary things.” He said nothing. “My fault, probably,” she said. “I wanted those things. God, did I want them. Makes it kind of hard for me to accept that maybe you don’t want them.” “I want you,” he said. She nodded. “I know that. And I want you. You know that too. But do we want each other’s lives?”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“Harper opened the door before Reacher was even dressed. He had his pants on and was smoothing the wrinkles out of his shirt with his palm against the mattress. “Love those scars,” she said. She took a step closer, looking at his stomach with undisguised curiosity. “What’s that one from?” she asked, pointing to his right side. He glanced down. The right side of his stomach had a violent tracery of stitches in the shape of a twisted star. They bulged out above the muscle wall, white and angry. “My mother did it,” he said. “Your mother?” “I was raised by grizzly bears. In Alaska.” She rolled her eyes”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“The dynamics of the city. His mother had been scared of cities. It had been part of his education. She had told him cities are dangerous places. They’re full of tough, scary guys. He was a tough boy himself but he had walked around as a teenager ready and willing to believe her. And he had seen that she was right. People on city streets were fearful and furtive and defensive. They kept their distance and crossed to the opposite sidewalk to avoid coming near him. They made it so obvious he became convinced the scary guys were always right behind him, at his shoulder. Then he suddenly realized no, I’m the scary guy. They’re scared of me. It was a revelation. He saw himself reflected in store windows and understood how it could happen. He had stopped growing at fifteen when he was already six feet five and two hundred and twenty pounds. A giant. Like most teenagers in those days he was dressed like a bum. The caution his mother had drummed into him was showing up in his face as a blank-eyed, impassive stare. They’re scared of me. It amused him and he smiled and then people stayed even farther away. From that point onward he knew cities were just the same as every other place, and for every city person he needed to be scared of there were nine hundred and ninety-nine others a lot more scared of him. He used the knowledge like a tactic, and the calm confidence it put in his walk and his gaze redoubled the effect he had on people. The dynamics of the city.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“squared his napkin on the tile next to him and started collecting the debris into it. The couple five tables away were watching him. ‘When are they coming back?’ Reacher asked. ‘An hour,’ the guy said. ‘How much do they want?’ The guy shrugged again and smiled a bitter smile. ‘I get a start-up discount,’ he said. ‘Two hundred a week, goes to four when the place picks up.’ ‘You want to pay?’ The guy made another sad face. ‘I want to stay in business, I guess. But paying out two bills a week ain’t exactly going to help me do that.’ The sandy guy and the dark woman were looking at the opposite wall, but they were listening. The opera fell away to a minor-key aria and the diva started in on it with a low mournful note. ‘Who were they?’ Reacher asked quietly. ‘Not Italians,’ the guy said. ‘Just some punks.’ ‘Can I use your phone?’ The guy nodded. ‘You know an office-supply store open late?’ Reacher asked. ‘Broadway, two blocks over,’ the guy said. ‘Why? You got business to attend to?’ Reacher nodded. ‘Yeah, business,”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“What about Minnick versus Mississippi?” Blake asked.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“EVERYBODY USES MOBILES. They use them all the time, just constantly. It’s a phenomenon of the modern age. Everybody’s talk, talk, talking, all the time, little black telephones pressed up to their faces. Where does all that conversation come from? What happened to all that conversation before mobiles were invented? Was it all bottled up? Burning ulcers in people’s guts? Or did it just develop spontaneously because technology made it possible?”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“The pilot was military, so he was using the rudder. Civilian pilots avoid using the rudder. Using the rudder makes the plane slew, like a car skids. Passengers don’t like the feeling. So civilian pilots turn by juicing the engines on one side and backing off on the others. Then”
― Lee Child, The Visitor

“It lined up behind a 747 bound for Tokyo the way a mouse lines up behind an elephant.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“The only thing he had bought for the house was a gold-colored filter cone for Leon’s old coffee machine. He figured it was easier than always running to the store to buy the paper kind. Ten past four that morning, he filled it with coffee from a can and added water and set the machine going. Rinsed out a mug at the sink and set it on the counter, ready.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“He turned back. Emptied the tube of glue into the first guy’s palms and crushed them together and counted to ten. Chemical handcuffs”
― Lee Child, Running Blind

“Every state puts a lot of effort into the first mile of its highways, to make you feel you’re entering a better place from a worse one. Reacher wondered why they didn’t put the effort into the last mile instead. That way, you’d miss the place you were leaving.”
― Lee Child, Running Blind