“People resist a census, but give them a profile page and they'll spend all day telling you who they are.”

“She had been in situations like this, where people said, Convince me, and in none of those had they actually wanted to be convinced. She could lay down a perfect argument and they just invented new...”

“All empires fall, eventually. But why? Its not for lack of power. In fact, it seems to be the opposite. Their power lulls them into comfort. They become undisciplined. Those who had to earn power a...”

“Good words were the difference between Emily eating well and not. And what she had found worked best were not facts or arguments but words that tickled peoples brains for some reason, that just amu...”

“ 'You can't stop me. Your word voodoo, it doesn't work on me. Right? So how do you think you're going to-' Eliot produced a pistol. He didn't seem to pull it from anywhere. He just suddenly had it....”

“It was always this way: The more people talked, the more they obscured. You didn't need to argue for the truth. You could see it.”

“Seek a slower, simpler life.”

“There is no such thing as escape after all, only an exchange of one set of difficulties for another. It wasn't Mark or the farm or marriage I was trying to shake loose from but my own imperfect sel...”

“Talking won't change it. But sometimes it was what she wanted most, to tell someone; often, though, she just wanted to escape those horrid feelings, to escape herself, so there was no pain, no fear...”

“In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”

“It's the fricking reality that destroys plans.”

“An exceedingly well-informed report,' said the General. 'You have given yourself the trouble to go into matters thoroughly, I see. That is one of the secrets of success in life.”

“Merciful Father.... I have squandered my days with plans of many things.This was not among them. But at this moment, I beg only, to live the next few minutes well.For all we ought to have thought a...”

“The best plans are always the simplest.”

“Yeah, and we could fly in on dragons and release a cloud of sugar plum fairies to tiptoe in an get the watch.”