Distinguishing the signal from the noise requires both scientific knowledge and self-knowledge: the serenity to accept the things we cannot predict, the courage to predict the things we can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
When we advance more confident claims and they fail to come to fruition, this constitutes much more powerful evidence against our hypothesis. We can't really blame anyone for losing faith when this occurs
Though angels were easy to finds in cemeteries, she said that she didn't especially care for funereal angels and tombstone cherubs -- she wanted her angels among the living, not watching over the already dead -- and thus she scoured parks and gardens...
Gently Agatha touched her face in the mirror, glowing from inside. A face no one recognized because it was so happy. There could be no turning back now. The bread crumbs on the dark trail were gone. Instead, she had the truth to guide her. A truth gr...
How, then, does the written word work? What part of a reader absorbs it - or should that be a double question: what part of a reader absorbs what part of a text? I think that underneath, or alongside, a reader's conscious response to a text, whatever...
The characters within a book were, from a certain point of view, identical on some fundamental level ‒ there weren't any images of them, no physical tangibility whatsoever. They were pictures in the reader's head, constructs of imagination and idea...
Mister didn't come with me on cases, being above such trivial matters, but he found me pleasant company when I was at home and not moving around too much, except when he didn't, in which case he went rambling
It took a freaking to put this together, Michael." I hefted my staff. "Fortunately," I said, and took a two-handed swing at the nearest stand of slender, delicate crystal. It shattered with gratifying ease, and the encasing light around the greater c...
Fredrika Bimm, what do you think you're doing?" "Freaking out. Losing my mind. Thinking about snapping your husband's spine. Squashing the urge to vomit. Wishing I had died at childbirth." "Oh, you say that when you don't get a prize in your Lucky Ch...
Outside, it feels like there is less standing between the Creator and us. There is a lingering visceral connection we can hear and see and smell, reminders of the bond between Creator and creation, like the mountain sage crushed up in the pocket of t...
Wait, go back to that Southern Baptist part,” Julia said, interrupting, as she does. “Are you a born-again?” articulating her question as if she were asking me if I were really a headhunter or a Martian. “Yes,” I said, “but I'm not an ass...
While it's true that you may lose your religion during the course of a lifetime, you never lose your salvation. Once you let Jesus in your kitchen, he just keeps on making peanut butter and banana sandwiches, and he never leaves.
Most people are good and occasionally do something they know is bad. Some people are bad and struggle every day to keep it under control. Others are corrupt to the core and don’t give a damn, as long as they don’t get caught. But evil is a comple...
Dying is overrated. Human sentimentality has twisted it into the ultimate act of love. Biggest load of bullshit in the world. Dying for someone isn't the hard thing. The man that dies escapes. Plain and simple. Game over. End of pain...Try living for...
With the Book hitching rides, hiding on people, guess we’re all going to be dressing like skanks for a while, huh? Skintight or skin. Dude, everybody’s everything’s gonna be hanging out, and some o’ those fat chicks at the abbey are gonna gro...
Here’s what I tell the newly elected: the truth is gonna get out—it always does—but it’s gonna blend in with all the lies.” The Senator twirled a hand in the air. “You have to deny each lie and every truth with the same vinegar. Let those...
He was demanding. He always would be. But sometimes, he was so vulnerable and she realized she had power in the relationship as well. She hadn’t expected that. He was as vulnerable to her as she was to him. He just acted arrogant and bossy, but dee...
When I think of the wisest people I know, they share one defining trait: curiosity. They turn away from the minutiae of their lives-and focus on the world around them. They are motivated by the desire to explore the unfamiliar. They are drawn toward ...
Life is choice. All day, everyday. Who we talk to, where we sit, what we say, how we say it. And our lives become defined by our choices. It's as simple and as complex as that. And as powerful. so when I'm observing that's what I'm watching for. The ...
Three Pines wasn’t on any tourist map, being too far off any main or even secondary road. Like Narnia, it was generally found unexpectedly and with a degree of surprise that such an elderly village should have been hiding in this valley all along. ...
I’m driving,” Louis-Cesare said, sliding into the low seat as easily as if he’d done it a hundred times. “You’re drunk.” I wished. “I had all of two beers, mostly for the water content.” “If you needed water, why didn’t you drink ...
