Storm Front

“Paranoid? Probably. But just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face.”

“Have you ever felt despair? Absolute hopelessness? Have you ever stood in the darkness and known, deep in your heart, in your spirit, that it was never, ever going to get better? That something had been lost, forever, and that it wasn't coming back?”

“I'd made the vampire cry. Great. I felt like a real superhero. Harry Dresden, breaker of monsters' hearts.”

“I think that men ought to treat women like something other than weaker men with breasts.”

“Smiling always seems to annoy people more than actually insulting them. Or maybe I just have an annoying smile.”

“Kids. You gotta love them. I adore children. A little salt, a squeeze of lemon—perfect.”

“I don't want to live in a world where the strong rule and the weak cower. I'd rather make a place where things are a little quieter. Where trolls stay the hell under their bridges and where elves don't come swooping out to snatch children from their cradles. Where vampires respect the limits, and where the faeries mind their p's and q's. My name is Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. Conjure by it at your own risk. When things get strange, when what goes bump in the night flicks on the lights, when no one else can help you, give me a call. I'm in the book.”

“Harry," Bob drawled, his eye lights flickering smugly, "what you know about women, I could juggle.”

“A technicality I'm prepared to hide wildly behind.”

“When I'm in turmoil, when I can't think, when I'm exhausted and afraid and feeling very, very alone, I go for walks. It's just one of those things I do. I walk and I walk and sooner or later something comes to me, something to make me feel less like jumping off a building.”

“EASTER HAS BEEN CANCELED—THEY FOUND THE BODY”

“You don't go walking into the proverbial lion's den lightly. You start with a good breakfast.”

“Where instinct fails, intellect must venture.”

“Have you ever been approached by a grim-looking man, carrying a naked sword with a blade about ten miles long in his hand, in the middle of the night, beneath the stars on the shores of Lake Michigan? If you have, seek professional help. If you have not, then believe you me, it can scare the bejeezus out of you.”

“HARRY DRESDEN—WIZARD Lost Items Found. Paranormal Investigations. Consulting. Advice. Reasonable Rates. No Love Potions, Endless Purses, Parties, or Other Entertainment”

“A man's magic demonstrates what sort of person he is, what is held most deeply inside of him. There is no truer gauge of a man's character than the way in which he employs his strength, his power. I was not a murderer. I was not like Victor Sells. I was Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. I was a wizard. Wizards control their power. They don't let it control them. And wizards don't use magic to kill people. They use it to discover, to protect, to mend, to help. Not to destroy.”

“Thank God for wisecracks.”

“Here had lived someone else who knew that the only thing waiting at home was a sense of loneliness. Sometimes it is comforting. Most often, it isn't.”

“There is no truer gauge of a man's character than the way in which he employs his strength, his power.”

“I was seducing shepherdesses when you weren't a twinkle in your great-grandcestor's eyes. I think I know what I'm doing.”

“Maybe my values are outdated, but I come from an old school of thought. I think that men ought to treat women like something other than just shorter, weaker men with breasts. Try and convict me if I’m a bad person for thinking so. I enjoy treating a woman like a lady, opening doors for her, paying for shared meals, giving flowers–all that sort of thing.”

“My head was throbbing, and my hands were shaking, but I went down the ladder to my workroom - and started figuring out how to rip someone's heart out of his chest from fifty miles away.Who says I never do anything fun on a Friday night?”

“At the moment I was mad enough to chew up nails and spit out paper clips.”

“Do you have a little white dress? I've had this deep-seated nurse fantasy about you, Murphy.”

“A pure heart and mind only takes you so far - sooner or later the hormones have their say, too.”

“Science, the largest religion of the twentieth century, had become tarnished by images of exploding space shuttles, crack babies, and a generation of complacent Americans who allowed the television to raise their children. People were looking for something - I think they just didn't know what. And even though they were once again starting to open their eyes to the world of magic and the arcane that had been with them all the while, they still thought I must be some kind of joke.”

“The world is getting weirder. Darker every single day. Things are spinning around faster and faster, and threatening to go completely awry. Falcons and falconers. The center cannot hold. But in my corner of the country, I'm trying to nail things down. I don't want to live in Victor's jungle, even if it did eventually devour him. I don't want to live in a world where the strong rule and the weak cower. I'd rather make a place where things are a little quieter. Where trolls stay the hell under their bridges and where elves don't come swooping out to snatch children from their cradles. Where vampires respect the limits, and where the faeries mind their p's and q's. My name is Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. Conjure by it at your own risk. When things get strange, when what goes bump in the night flicks on the lights, when no one else can help you, give me a call. I'm in the book.”

“Never let it be said that Harry Dresden is afraid of a dried, dead bug. Creepy or not, I wasn't going to let it ruin my concentration.So I scooped it up with the corner of the phone book and popped it into the middle drawer of my desk. Out of sight, out of mind.So I have a problem with creepy, dead, poisonous things. So sue me.”

“She's going to do nothing but try to trick information out of me that I shouldn't be giving her, Mac," I said."Ungh," Mac agreed."Why did I say yes?"Mac shrugged."She's pretty," I said. "Smart. Sexy.""Ungh.""Any red-blooded man would have done the same thing.""Hngh," Mac snorted."Well. Maybe not you."Mac smiled a bit, mollified."Still. It's going to make trouble for me. I must be crazy to go for someone like that." I picked up my sandwich, and sighed."Dumb," Mac said."I just said she was smart, Mac."Mac's face flickered into that smile, and it made him look years younger, almost boyish. "Not her," he said. "You.”

“They say we wizards are subtle. But believe you me, we've got nothing, nothing at all, on women.”