Lois McMaster Bujold
American author of science fiction and fantasy works, most noted for the works in her Vorkosigan Saga.
Vorreedi stated dangerously, "I am not a mushroom, Lieutenant Vorkosigan."
To be kept in the dark and fed on horseshit, right. Miles sighed inwardly.
When a normal ensign looked at his commander, he ought to see a godlike being, not a, a... future subordinate. New ensigns were supposed to be a subhuman species anyway.
You couldn't be that good and not know it, somewhere in your secret heart, however much you'd been abused into affecting public humility.
I have a catchphrase to describe my plot-generation technique — "What's the worst possible thing I can do to these people?"
"Most men", he quoted, "are of naught more use in their lives but as machines for turning food into shit."
Ivan cocked an eyebrow at him. "Who said that? Your grandfather?"
"Leonardo da Vinci," Miles returned primly. But was compelled to add, "Grandfather quoted it to me, though."
"Am I reading too much into all that innuendo, or did you in fact just connive to assassinate Gregor in one breath, offer to cuckold him in the next, accuse your father of homosexuality, suggest a patricidal plot against him, and league yourself with Cavilo -- what are you going to do for an encore?"
"Depends on the straight lines."
I'm sorry. I can love you. I can grieve for you, or with you. I can share your pain. But I cannot judge you.
Don't worry about that depressing old dictum "Write what you know". If you need to know something, look it up. Learn how to find out what you need to know to make it right. Be passionate, be picky, have enough self-criticism to demand of yourself your best and not sort of let it slide by. And remember that the greatest defect any piece of fiction can have is not to be finished.
The shocked silence that followed was decidedly baffled. And even, possibly, a little thoughtful, if that was not too much to hope.
Right or wrong, what I also saw was that you made an enemy, and left him alive behind you. Great charity. Bad tactics.
If the truth doesn't save us, what does that say about us?
I for one find a casual destruction of a man's life even more repugnant than a determined one.
I have no idea why some of my books draw awards and others don't, except that the ones I spent the least time worrying about other people's response to — that I wrote for myself — seem to do the best of all.
Never... ever suggest they don't have to pay you. What they pay for, they'll value. What they get for free, they'll take for granted, and then demand as a right. Hold them up for all the market will bear.
Adulthood isn't an award they'll give you for being a good child. You can waste... years, trying to get someone to give that respect to you, as though it were a sort of promotion or raise in pay. If only you do enough, if only you are good enough. No. You have to just... take it. Give it to yourself, I suppose. Say, I'm sorry you feel like that and walk away. But that's hard.
"Don't panic."
"I'm not panicking, I'm watching you panic. It's more entertaining."
I have denied my eyes, both inner and outer. I am not a child, or virgin, or modest wife, fearing to offend. No one owns my eyes now but me. If I have not the stomach by now to look upon any sight in the world, good or evil, beautiful or vile, when shall I? It is far too late for innocence. My only hope is the much more painful consolation of wisdom. Which can grow out of knowledge alone. Give me my true eyes. I want to see. I have to know.
Miles started to track the vote, but by the time the roll came around to him, had taken to jotting repeated iterations of Lady Ekaterin Nile Vorkosigan intertwined with Lord Miles Naismith Vorkosigan in his fanciest handwriting down the margins of his flimsy.
"Ba Vorpatril?" Miles intoned, eyes alight.
Live, and so confound our enemies.