Ari Alexander The Taking Series Quotes

I won't let ignorance murder the people I love. ~ Melissa West

Writings can be stolen, or changed, or used for evil purposes. But isn't the risk worth taking? The more people who share knowledge, the greater safeguard for it. Isn't there more danger in ignorance than knowledge? ~ Lloyd Alexander

Was it worth it?" he asked me, breaking the silence.
"Was what worth it?" I asked, looking up at him.
"Taking a chance with me," he said softly, kissing the top of my head. "Not thinking, going with your gut?"
"It was the best chance I've ever taken," I said, snuggling closer to him and breathing in his familiar scent. ~ Monica Alexander

The part of my brain that was responsible for creating the world I lived and moved in and for taking the raw data that came in through my senses and fashioning it into a meaningful universe: that part of my brain was down, and out. And yet despite all of this, I had been alive, and aware, truly aware, in a universe characterized above all by love, consciousness, and reality. There was, for me, simply no arguing this fact. I knew it so completely that I ached. ~ Eben Alexander

General editors' preface The growth of translation studies as a separate discipline is a success story of the 1980s. The subject has developed in many parts of the world and is clearly destined to continue developing well into the twenty-first century. Translation studies brings together work in a wide variety of fields, including linguistics, literary study, history, anthropology, psychology, and economics. This series of books will reflect the breadth of work in translation studies and will enable readers to share in the exciting new developments that are taking place at the present time. ~ Lawrence Venuti

You have your orders," Mab shouted at the guards. "To the Deeps with her."
The men led me from the great hall, taking me along a series of corridors to the back of the castle, then winding through another long corridor and into a spiraling stairwell that appeared to have no end. We went further and further down until finally it ended so deep in the ground it felt like a grave. My pulse quickened as we reached the bottom.
A single dark door lay ahead. ~ H.D. Smith

Now King Alexander is driving down the familiar streets, curiously unguarded, in a curiously antique car. It can be seen from his attempt to make his stiff hand supple, from a careless flash of his careful black eyes, it can be seen that he is taking the cheers of the crowd with a childish seriousness. It is touching, like a girl putting full faith in the compliments that are paid to her at a ball. ~ Rebecca West

Tania, I was spellbound by you from the first moment I saw you. There I was, living my dissolute life, and war had just started. My entire base was in disarray, people were running around, closing accounts, taking money out, grabbing food out of stores, buying up the entire Gostiny Dvor, volunteering for the army, sending their kids to camp - " He broke off. "And in the middle of my chaos, there was you!" Alexander whispered passionately. "You were sitting alone on this bench, impossibly young, breathtakingly blonde and lovely, and you were eating ice cream with such abandon, such pleasure, such mystical delight that I could not believe my eyes. As if there were nothing else in the world on that summer Sunday. ~ Paullina Simons

Until now the theory of infinite series in general has been very badly grounded. One applies all the operations to infinite series as if they were finite; but is that permissible? I think not. Where is it demonstrated that one obtains the differential of an infinite series by taking the differential of each term? Nothing is easier than to give instances where this is not so. ~ Niels Henrik Abel

This seat taken?" My eyes grazing over the only other occupant, a guy with long glossy dark hair with his head bent over a book.
"It's all yours," he says. And when he lifts his head and smiles,my heart just about leaps from my chest.
It's the boy from my dreams.
The boy from the Rabbit Hole,the gas station,and the cave-sitting before me with those same amazing,icy-blue eues, those same alluring lips I've kissed multiple times-but only in slumber, never in waking life.
I scold my heart to settle,but it doesn't obey.
I admonish myself to sit,to act normal, casual-and I just barely succeed.
Stealing a series of surreptitious looks as I search through my backpack, taking in his square chin,wide generous lips,strong brow,defined cheekbones, and smooth brown skin-the exact same features as Cade.
"You're the new girl,right?" He abandons his book,tilting his head in a way that causes his hair to stream over his shoulder,so glossy and inviting it takes all of my will not to lean across the table and touch it.
I nod in reply,or at least I think I do.I can't be too sure.I'm too stricken by his gaze-the way it mirrors mine-trying to determine if he knows me, recognizes me,if he's surprised to find me here.Wishing Paloma had better prepared me-focused more on him and less on his brother.
I force my gaze from his.Bang my knee hard against the table as I swivel in my seat.Feeling so odd and unsettled,I wish I'd picked another place to sit, thoug ~ Alyson Noel

At 11, I went to Misha's school for two summers. So when I wasn't in that school, I was taking classes at David Howard or Robert Denver's studios - kind of legendary places - and there was one summer where Alexander Godunov sort of took me under his wing; the memory's a little murky, but I felt as if I was his project for those weeks. ~ Sascha Radetsky

If they analyze the situation as thoroughly as they should, Muslims will realize they are the first targets. What are the fundamentalists really after? Simply taking over Islam and then turning its back on modernity. ~ Alexander Haig

I roll over on my back and clutch the book against my chest; then I chuck it on the carpet. It's too heavy to rest on me, too full of history. Not all of it is bad. Some of the memories make me smile. Some of them make me mad. But more dangerously, some of them make me wonder what my life would be like as a girlfriend, what it would be like to have a regular relationship, with all its ups and downs and awkward moments.
I switch out my lamp and stare at the ceiling in the dark, taking a series of shaky breaths. I know that it's better this way, being the one in control. The one in control calls the shots, and the one in control sets the pace.
Most important of all, the one in control doesn't get hurt. ~ Laurie Elizabeth Flynn

Burn wounds always elicited pain more terrible than anything else he had ever endured. He didn't relish the idea of forcing himself to suffer through such agony. But it was necessary. Earth depended on them taking possession of the key. "It's the only way out," Andrew reminded him.
"I understand that, but - "
"The trials we have faced thus far have been minimal," Andrew said, cutting off Sebastian's retort. "What we seek is the key to the universe. You didn't expect it to be easy, did you? ~ Laura Kreitzer

At some point in every racer's life he has to make his peace with cheating. I do not approve of cheating ... at all. Of course, like every successful racer, I differentiate between taking advantage of loopholes in the regulations, stretching the grey areas and outright cheating. In any given racing series I will not start the cheating. If someone else starts it, I will appeal to them and to the officials to stop it. If my efforts do not succeed, then I'll show them how it is done ... ~ Carroll Smith

Who's that hot piece of cowboy standing with Nathan?" She pointed toward one end of the barn by a stack of hay bales.
A scowl tightened all the muscles in his face as he followed the length of her arm to the direction of her fingertip. Before he could answer, she was already pulling him again. This time toward his cousin.
"Nate, who's your friend?" she asked, not bothering with hellos. Letting go of Caleb's hand and leaving him feeling empty, she shifted her weight to her toes when she stopped in front of Preston. "Your eyes remind me of those old Sprite bottles. I found one at a flea market once. I think it's still lying around somewhere in my room."
Nathan's chuckle caught her attention. "Diana Alexander, let me introduce you to Preston Grant. He's a childhood friend of mine and Caleb's. Pres, this is Didi."
"Can I paint you naked?" she asked, unabashed, looking up at him. Nathan's chuckles became full-blown laughter. She hiked her thumb at Caleb. His scowl deepened. "This one's too shy."
"It's nice to meet you, Didi," Preston said. He seemed unperturbed by her request. The bastard.
She danced to Nathan's side and leaned in conspiratorially, not taking her eyes away from Preston. "Between you and me," she whispered loud enough for Caleb and the object of her fascination to hear, "just how far does his tan go?"
That had done it. The words came out of his mouth without thinking. "If you're going to paint someone naked, it will be me." With i ~ Kate Evangelista

Is it possible to have an endless series of successes without falling on our faces? I suppose it is, but I think it would entail doing the same things over and over again without taking chances, without taking risks or exploring our limits, without finding out what we can and can't do. ~ Alan Arkin

Where are you taking me?" Andrew demanded, whirling on the Ferryman. His muscles tensed, hands curling in and out of fists.
"To my master." The voice was ghostly, whispers of black ash and death, words cold and detached.
He had an idea who that was but asked anyway: "And who is your master?"
No answer came.
Andrew's insatiable rage rose up and swallowed his grief like a yawning ocean mouth, the darkest depths surging to the surface to form a mighty tidal wave. He closed the distance and seized the Ferryman's gaunt wrist. There was no substance, no life beneath the cloak. The Ferryman slowly turned his hooded head, and Andrew found himself looking into the black hole of a self-contained night. The olfactory of decay was a punch in the face. Andrew released the Ferryman's wrist and hastily stepped back, rocking the boat as he put distance between him and the unnatural wind spilling from the gaping orifice. Andrew shivered, the tiny hairs on his neck saluting. The cloaked head faced forward again, and the wind died away. ~ Laura Kreitzer

The pot that had simmered for fifty years boiled over. Colliers and miners, furnacemen and tram-road labourers were flooding down the valley to the Chartists' rendezvous: men from Dowlais under the Guests, Cyfartha under the Crawshays, Nantyglo under Bailey and a thousand forges and bloomeries in the hills: men of the farming Welsh, the Staffordshire specialists and the labouring Irish were taking to arms. ~ Alexander Cordell

Say your boss has been taking longer than usual to respond to your e-mails. Many people would take that as a sign that their star is falling because if your star is falling, the chances are high that your boss will respond to your e-mails more slowly than before. But your boss might be slower in responding because she is unusually busy or her mother is ill. And so the chances that your star is falling if she is taking longer to respond are much lower than the chances that your boss will respond more slowly if your star is falling. The appeal of many conspiracy theories depends on the misunderstanding of this logic. That is, it depends on confusing the probability that a series of events would happen if it were the product of a huge conspiracy with the probability that a huge conspiracy exists if a series of events occurs. The effect on the probability that an event will occur if or given that other events occur is what Bayes's theory is all about. To ~ Leonard Mlodinow

The same thing happens in the search for the laws of historical movement.
The movement of mankind, proceeding from a countless number of human wills, occurs continuously.
To comprehend the laws of this movement is the goal of history. But in order to comprehend the laws of the continuous movement of the sum of all individual wills, human reason allows for arbitrary, discrete units. The first method of history consists in taking an arbitrary series of continuous events and examining it separately from others, whereas there is not and cannot be a beginning to any event, but one event always continuously follows another. The second method consists in examining the actions of one person, a king, a commander, as the sum of individual wills, whereas the sum of individual wills is never expressed in the activity of one historical person.
Historical science in its movement always takes ever smaller units for examination, and in this way strives to approach the truth. But however small the units that history takes, we feel that allowing for a unit that is separate from another, allowing for the beginning of some phenomenon, and allowing for the notion that all individual wills are expressed in the actions of one historical person, is false in itself.
Any conclusion of historical science, without the least effort on the part of criticism, falls apart like dust, leaving nothing behind, only as a result of the fact that criticism selects as an object for observation a ~ Leo Tolstoy

Taking your clothes off and spreading yourself on top of Roman Bradford's desk is a bad idea."

"I was thinking more along the lines of dropping to my knees and going all Hoover on his cock," Derrick announced with a tremulous smile. "I do give great head. I figure I'll have him eating out of my hand in no time."

Derrick Swain, Hearsay ~ Taylor V. Donovan

She was prepared for him to shut her down, when Behr shrugged a shoulder and said, "Yeah, sounds good. I think it's a good idea for you to get out of the house. But," he said, stepping back into the kitchen and leveling her with a hard look, "only if I tag along."
"What? Why?" Cheyenne questioned, not understanding the need for chaperones.
"Because it's safer that way," he reasoned. "I have a couple things to take care of first, so it will probably be a day or two. I expect you to wait for me, though, Cheyenne," he said, his brilliant blue eyes holding her in place. "It's safer that way."
She was preparing to argue when she realized that she wasn't altogether sure she wanted to venture out on her own yet anyway. It might be a shock to her system after locking herself away for so long. For laughs, she decided to give him a hard time anyway.
"But…" she started. He cut her off with an upraised hand.
"No buts," he said sternly. "It's not safe and you know it, and besides, that's what you have two strapping young men like us for." He clapped a grinning Dehstroy on the back.
Cheyenne threw her head back and laughed.
"You, young? Ha!"
"What?" Behr said, acting offended. "I'm young."
"Prove it," Cheyenne challenged. "Show me your birth certificate." When he pursed his lips, she laughed some more. "What's wrong? Didn't they make birth certificates yet when you were born? No?" She looked between the men, taking in their sheepish expres ~ Brandi Salazar

From *the form of time and of the single dimension* of the series of representations, on account of which the intellect, in order to take up one thing, must drop everything else, there follows not only the intellect's distraction, but also its *forgetfulness*. Most of what it has dropped it never takes up again, especially as the taking up again is bound to the principle of sufficient reason, and thus requires an occasion which the association of ideas and motivation have first to provide. Yet this occasion may be the remoter and the smaller, the more our susceptibility to it is enhanced by interest in the subject. But, as I have already shown in the essay *On the Principle of Sufficient Reason*, memory is not a receptacle, but a mere faculty, acquired by practice, of bringing forth any representations at random, so that these have always to be kept in practice by repetition, otherwise they are gradually lost. Accordingly, the knowledge even of the scholarly head exists only *virtualiter* as an acquired practice in producing certain representations. *Actualiter*, on the other hand, it is restricted to one particular representation, and for the moment is conscious of this one alone. Hence there results a strange contrast between what a man knows *potentia* and what he knows *actu*, in other words, between his knowledge and his thinking at any moment. The former is an immense and always somewhat chaotic mass, the latter a single, distinct thought. The relation is like that betw ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

His lips brushed over hers. She let out a sigh of relief and joy and pleasure. He pulled her tighter against him, taking her mouth with his own. She melted into him and the kiss, heart pounding, desire sparking along her nerve endings like a string of lit dynamite. ~ B.J. Daniels

Diplomacy, Democracy, and parenting are very much the same. It's an act of creating and maintaining control over people without them becoming aware of it while rousing their allegiance through fear or manipulation to protect your right to continue taking advantage of them and their loyalty. ~ Mitch Alexander

I went to watch the Buzkasgu game taking place on a series of fields - some fallow, some plowed and planted- just to the east of the empty Buddha niches. Buzkashi is a form of polo played with a dead goat instead of a ball. ~ Rory Stewart

I love you," Colt declared against Jace's lips.
"I love you, too." Jace made Colt smile.
"Thank you for taking me back." Colt
kissed the tip of Jace's nose.
"Thank you for finding me," Jace mumbled into the pillow on a deep yawn. "I need to sleep.Be here when I wake up."
"I'm here for as long as you want me. I promise I'll be here when you wake, Jace," he whispered and pressed a kiss to Jace's furrowed brow."Every day ... for the rest of our lives. ~ Kindle Alexander

In my long career in this historical fiction business, though, I've found that the most effective storytelling concept is this: Once upon a time it was now.
That has become my credo and my method as a longtime historical novelist.
It's quite simple, if you see as Janus sees:
Today is now.
Yesterday was now.
Tomorrow will be now.
Three hundred years ago, the eighteenth century was now.
You, as a historical novelist, can make any time now by taking your reader into that time. Once you grasp that, the rest is just hard work.
Stay with me, and you'll see how such work is done. ~ James Alexander Thom

learn the lessons before they are over. Life is a composition of series and sequence of lessons. Each lesson comes with its own lessons to learn. our failure to learn the lessons of one shall be the reasons to learn another lesson with similar lessons. ~ Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

In my head, the 5 issues of A Spoon Too Short comprise one novel: a 100 page graphic novel sequel to Douglas' two Dirk books, taking some of the ideas he was working on before he died, and a whole bunch of new stuff from me and a little from Max Landis (who is the Executive Producer on the book as well as writing the forthcoming TV series). ~ Arvind Ethan David

Danes express their strongest feelings in conjunction with food. That became clear to me the first time I was out visiting friends with Moritz. When I took a third helping of cookies, he looked straight at me.
"Keep on taking until you're ashamed of yourself," he said.
I wasn't confident about my Danish, but I understood what he meant. I helped myself three more times. Without taking my eyes off him. The room disappeared, the people we were visiting disappeared, I didn't taste the cookies. Only Moritz existed.
"I'm still not ashamed," I said.
I helped myself three more times. Then he grabbed the platter and put it out of my reach. I had won. The first of a long series of small, important victories over him and Danish manners. ~ Peter Hoeg

Americans are sick of the idea of the government taking over everything and trying to run it. We don't know how to run a bank, a car company. ~ Lamar Alexander

Meditation is a mysterious method of self-restoration.
It involves "shutting" out the outside world, and by that means sensing the universal "presence" which is, incidentally, absolute perfect peace.
It is basically an existential "time-out" - a way to "come up for a breath of air" out of the noisy clutter of the world.
But don't be afraid, there is nothing arcane or supernatural or creepy about the notion of taking a time-out. Ball players do it. Kids do it, when prompted by their parents. Heck, even your computer does it (and sometimes not when you want it to).
So, why not you?
A meditation can be as simple as taking a series of easy breaths, and slowly, gently counting to ten in your mind. ~ Vera Nazarian

Take care, you fair lassies!" In full Scottish brogue, James pulled the sleigh up beside the porch stairs. "A wicked storm's a brewin'!" Molly's train of thought derailed as he climbed the icy stairs and slipped an arm around her none-too-tiny waist. She felt about as big as a barn these days. "You best hang on to me for all you're worth, Molly girl!" He winked. "With both hands, if you'd like." Giggling, Rachel raised a discreet brow as if to say, "Friendship?" "You be careful taking her home, James. ~ Tamera Alexander

Trust in the familiar seems to be matched by wariness of the unfamiliar. Jennifer Richeson of Northwestern University has conducted experiments in which white subjects had to interact in some way with a white or a black man before taking a mental test. Those who dealt with the black man got lower scores on the test, and their brain scans showed what Prof. Richeson called "heightened activity in areas of the brain associated with regulating our thoughts and emotions." She interpreted this to mean that white subjects were struggling with the "awkwardness" or "exhaustion" of dealing with a black man, and that this interfered with their ability to take the mental test.
Researchers at Harvard and New York University had white and black subjects look repeatedly at a series of photographs of black and white faces, all with neutral expressions. Every time the subjects looked at one particular black face and one particular white face they got a mild electric shock. Lie detector-type devices showed that subjects would sweat - a typical stress reaction - when they saw the two faces they associated with the shocks. The researchers showed the photo series several times again, but without the shocks. White subjects quickly stopped sweating when they saw the white face formerly associated with the shock, but continued to sweat when they saw the black face. Black subjects had the opposite reaction, continuing to sweat when they saw the white but not the black face. Mahzarin Banaji, the ~ Jared Taylor

They stared at each other, and Alessandro seriously considered turning away from his father's wishes and just taking this woman and running off somewhere with her. He could imagine being happy with her. He felt free, easy. The feeling was heady. But dangerously so. He could never just toss aside his father's demands that way, even if he wanted to. There would be too much at stake. ~ E. Jamie

And in a way, this was how he had come to see his death, as a series of small ones taking place over the course of his life and leading finally to the main event, which would be so anti-climatic, so undramatic (a sudden violent seizure in his long abused heart, a quick massive flooding of the brain) it would go unnoticed. It was the small deaths occurring over an entire lifetime that took the greater toll. ~ Paule Marshall

Alexander. Here he is, before he was Tatiana's, at the age of twenty, getting his medal of valor for bringing back Yuri Stepanov during the 1940 Winter War. Alexander is in his dress Soviet uniform, snug against his body, his stance at-ease and his hand up to his temple in teasing salute. There is a gleaming smile on his face, his eyes are carefree, his whole man-self full of breath-taking, aching youth. And yet, the war was on, and his men had already died and frozen and starved … and his mother and father were gone… and he was far away from home, and getting farther and farther, and every day was his last – one way or another, every day was his last. And yet, he smiles, he shines, he is happy. ~ Paullina Simons

I remember taking my mom and dad to the premiere of 'The Inbetweeners Movie' and being really nervous. My mom was like, 'Laura, don't worry: I've watched all of the first series of the TV show, so I understand what this is going to be like.' ~ Laura Haddock

I wanted to be a spy," Olga said, shrugging. "I applied to the CIA. I was turned down. I did not meet the psychological profile. Oppositional Defiance Disorder. Basically, I have a hard time taking orders from idiots."

"Don't think of me as an idiot and I won't give you an idiotic order," Sophia said. "But if I give you one, you'd better do it. Because it's probably going to mean surviving or dying."

"You I don't mind," Olga said. "Or I wouldn't have joined your crew. Don't ask me about Nazar. So I was in Spain with the troupe. When the Plague hit, they shut down travel. And all my guns were in America. In a zombie apocalypse. I was quite upset."

"You should have seen Faith when they told her she had to be disarmed in New York," Sophia said. "Then they gave her a taser and that was mistake. What kind of guns?"

"I like that your family prefers the AK series," Olga said. "I really do think it's superior to the M16 series in many ways. Much more reliable. They say it is less accurate but that is at longer ranges. The round is not designed for long range."

"I can hit at a thousand meters with my accurized AK," Sophia said. "It's a matter of knowing the ballistics. It's not real powerful at that range, but try doing the same thing with an M4. I'll wait."

"Oh, jeeze, you two," Paula said. "Get a room."

"So continue with how you got on the yacht," Sophia said. "We don't want our cook getting all woozy with ~ John Ringo