All the Devils Are Here Quotes

“Life can be cruel, as you know. But it can also be kind. Filled with wonders. You need to remember that. You have your own choice to make, Armand. What’re you going to focus on? What’s unfair, or all the wonderful things that happen? Both are true, both are real. Both need to be accepted. But which carries more weight with you?” Stephen tapped the boy’s chest. “The terrible or the wonderful? The goodness or the cruelty? Your life will be decided by that choice.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“I just sit where I'm put, composed
of stone and wishful thinking:
That the deity that kills for pleasure will also
heal,
That in the midst of your nightmare,
the final one, a kind lion will pick your soul
up gently
by the nape of the neck,
And caress you into darkness and paradise.

~ Ruth Zardo, poet and character in All The Devils Are Here”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Hell is the truth seen too late,”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Hell is the truth seen too late,” said Reine-Marie as she poured out more coffee. “Thomas Hobbes.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“history wasn’t just written by the victors. First it had to be erased and rewritten. Replacing troublesome truth with self-serving myth.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Patience. Patience. With patience comes choice, and with choice comes power.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Dreadful deeds were obvious. The divine was often harder to see.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“C. S. Lewis wrote that we can create situations in which we are happy, but we cannot create joy. It just happens.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“There was nothing right or good in dying for your country. A necessity, sometimes, yes. But always a tragedy. Not an aspiration.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“But then, Armand Gamache thought, where else would you find darkness but right up against the light? What greater triumph for evil than to ruin a garden?”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“It would be natural for some to feel that pressure and choose speed over quality. And try to hide it when something goes wrong. Not because they’re bad people, but because they’re people. That way lies tragedy.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“We just don’t know. The key is to keep going. Joy might be just around the corner.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“it didn’t feel wrong. It felt wretched. Horrific. A nightmare. But sometimes “right” felt like that.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Who hurt you once, so far beyond repair / that you would greet each overture with curling lip? The lines from Ruth Zardo’s poem exploded in his head. In his chest. Me, he realized with horror. I did.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Don’t believe everything you think. Chief Inspector Gamache wrote that on the board for the incoming cadets at the start of every year at the Sûreté academy, and it stayed there all year.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Less a hunter than an explorer, Armand Gamache delved into what people thought, but mostly how they felt. Because that was where actions were conceived. Noble acts. And acts of the greatest cruelty.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Each day they tracked down killers. Each day they put their own lives on the line. And in return they were scapegoated. Chained to the ground, food for politicians looking for reelection.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“I just sit where I'm put, composed
of stone and wishful thinking:
That the deity that kills for pleasure will also heal,
That in the midst of your nightmare,
the final one, a kind lion will pick your soul up gently
by the nape of the neck,
And caress you into darkness and paradise.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“With patience comes choice, and with choice comes power.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“What’re you going to focus on? What’s unfair, or all the wonderful things that happen? Both are true, both are real. Both need to be accepted. But which carries more weight with you?” Stephen tapped the boy’s chest. “The terrible or the wonderful? The goodness or the cruelty?”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Michael took me to Paris for the first time back in 1995. I was thirty-six years old and we’d been seeing each other for five months. He was invited to give a talk on childhood leukemia to a conference in Toulouse, and asked if I’d like to go along. When I regained consciousness I said, yes, yes, yes please! We flew out of Montréal in a snowstorm, almost missing the flight. Michael was, to be honest, a little vague on details, like departure times of planes, trains, buses. In fact, almost all appointments. This was the trip where I realized we each had strengths. Mine seemed to be actually getting us to places. His was making it fun once there. On our first night in Paris we went to a wonderful restaurant, then for a walk. At some stage he said, “I’d like to show you something. Look at this.” He was pointing to the trunk of a tree. Now, I’d actually seen trees before, but I thought there must be something extraordinary about this one. “Get up close,” he said. “Look at where I’m pointing.” It was dark, so my nose was practically touching his finger, lucky man. Then, slowly, slowly, his finger began moving, scraping along the bark. I was cross-eyed, following it. And then it left the tree trunk. And pointed into the air. I followed it. And there was the Eiffel Tower. Lit up in the night sky. As long as I live, I will never forget that moment. Seeing the Eiffel Tower with Michael. And the dear man, knowing the magic of it for a woman who never thought she’d see Paris, made it even more magical by making it a surprise. C. S. Lewis wrote that we can create situations in which we are happy, but we cannot create joy. It just happens. That moment I was surprised by complete and utter joy. A little more than a year earlier I knew that the best of life was behind me. I could not have been more wrong. In that year I’d gotten sober, met and fell in love with Michael, and was now in Paris. We just don’t know. The key is to keep going. Joy might be just around the corner”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Sauve qui peut.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“truth is on the march and nothing will stop it.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“If stupid was sand, he’d be half the Sahara.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Armand stood up, still holding Stephen’s hand, and said, “It’s time. Let him go.” Then he sat back down, his legs weak. If this was the right thing to do, why did it feel so wrong? But no, it didn’t feel wrong. It felt wretched. Horrific. A nightmare. But sometimes “right” felt like that.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Gamache had patiently explained, over and over, over the years, that he was doing something. He was thinking. It had taken Beauvoir years to see the power of pausing. And of patience. Of taking a breath to consider all options, all angles, and not simply acting on the most obvious.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“He’d paused at the entrance and was, once again, staring down at the mosaic in the floor. Jostled and shoved by impatient guests, Armand stood his ground and contemplated the ancient symbol of Paris before it was Paris. Jacques had quoted the Latin motto. Fluctuat nec mergitur. Beaten by the waves, but never sinks. For the first time, despite seeing it for decades, Armand realized the mosaic looked like a scene from The Tempest. Shakespeare’s play opened with a terrible storm, and a ship in peril. As a young man leaped from a sinking ship to almost certain death, he screamed, “Hell is empty, and all the devils are here.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“Le Bon Marché was the oldest, the first, store of its kind in Paris. Practically in the world. Opened in 1852, it predated Selfridges in London by more than half a century. In fact, the Hôtel Lutetia was built by the owner of Le Bon Marché, primarily to give his customers someplace to stay while spending money in his remarkable store.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here

“He knew in his heart that anything that offered such peace had great value.”
― Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here