Top 500 Joe Abercrombie Quotes (2025 Update)
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351. “The gods hate those who plan badly, and help those with good friends, good swords, and good sense.”

— Joe Abercrombie

352. “She was the scab he couldn’t stop picking, the split lip he couldn’t stop biting at, the loose thread he couldn’t stop tugging.”

— Joe Abercrombie

353. “Brand stared in sick disbelief. He’d been sure among all those lads someone would speak, for they were honest enough. Or Hunnan would tell his part in it, for he was a respected master-at-arms. The king or the queen would draw out the truth, for they were wise and righteous. The gods wouldn’t allow such an injustice to pass. Someone would do something. Maybe, like him, they were all waiting for someone else to put things right.”

— Joe Abercrombie

354. “There aren’t many good things don’t have a splinter of selfishness in them somewhere, after all.”

— Joe Abercrombie

355. “Seemed that Logen’s father had been right. You can never have too many knives.”

— Joe Abercrombie

356. “A minister stands for Father Peace, but a good one is no stranger to Mother War.”

— Joe Abercrombie

357. “He’s a bloody idiot who knows nothing about anything, but he was born with a cock, so he gets to decide for all of us.”

— Joe Abercrombie

358. “Of all things, men most love to watch ohers face Death. It reminds them they yet live.”

— Joe Abercrombie

359. “But things are always going to be better, or were better long ago. No politician ever got anywhere by telling people things are just right as they are.”

— Joe Abercrombie

360. “Sometimes, when someone lives in danger for too long, the only time they feel alive is when death’s breathing on their shoulder.”

— Joe Abercrombie

361. “It’s not easy is it? Being a great man’s son. You’d thought that would come with all kinds of advantages – with borrowed admiration, and respect. But it’s only as easy as it is for the seeds of a great tree, trying to grow in its choking shadow. Not many make it to the sunlight for themselves.”

— Joe Abercrombie

362. “That’s what war does. Strips people and places of their identities and turns them into enemies in a line, positions to be taken, resources to be foraged. Anonymous things that can be carelessly crushed, and stolen, and burned without guilt.”

— Joe Abercrombie

363. “A cynic might observe that the scriptures can be used to support both sides of every argument.”

— Joe Abercrombie

364. “His ability was exceeded only by his belief in his own ability.”

— Joe Abercrombie

365. “What better foundation for an alliance than mutual hatred and suspicion?”

— Joe Abercrombie

366. “And, almost without realizing it, respect can develop. Liking. Even love.′ Laithlin’s voice seemed suddenly broken. “Almost... without realizing it.”

— Joe Abercrombie

367. “Perhaps we look at others and see only the things we don’t have.”

— Joe Abercrombie

368. “Disbelieve this sword, it will still cut you. He is God. We all walk His path regardless.”

— Joe Abercrombie

369. “Well.” Glokta looked towards the summer revellers. So near to them, yet somehow in a different world. “I have often said that life is the misery we endure between disappointments.”

— Joe Abercrombie

370. “Didn’t seem likely, but what’s the point of likely fantasies?”

— Joe Abercrombie

371. “When one man knowingly kills another, they call it murder! When society causes the deaths of thousands, they shrug and call it a fact of life.”

— Joe Abercrombie

372. “But that’s the nice thing about looking backwards. You can pick out the bits that suit your story and toss the unhappy truths to the wind.”

— Joe Abercrombie

373. “A man who’s not content with what he’s got, well, more than likely he won’t be content with what he hasn’t.”

— Joe Abercrombie

374. “Watching a man’s entrails spilling out is excellent entertainment, but the sight of his cock, well, that would be obscene.”

— Joe Abercrombie

375. “It is my sad observation that some men always want more.”

— Joe Abercrombie

376. “Science is a system of rational thought devised to investigate the world and establish the laws by which it operates. The scientist uses those laws to achieve an effect. One which might easily appear magical in the eyes of the primitive.”

— Joe Abercrombie

377. “She scarcely ever had a moment to herself, but she was grateful for that, too. When she was alone, the things she had seen and done the day of the uprising rushed into her mind, like filthy water into a holed boat, and dragged her down so quickly she felt she was drowning.”

— Joe Abercrombie

378. “You would’ve thought the more pain you suffered, the more you’d get used to it, but it was the other way around.”

— Joe Abercrombie

379. “Strange, how quickly a king could become an animal. Or half a king half an animal. Perhaps even those we raise highest never get that far above the mud.”

— Joe Abercrombie

380. “All heroes’ news, like something from the songs, but there’s nothing like others’ successes to make your own failures sting the worse.”

— Joe Abercrombie

381. “Never thought o’ myself as a man who fills sacks with heads.” “No one sets off in that direction,” said Clover, puffing out his cheeks one more time. “But before you know it, there you bloody are.”

— Joe Abercrombie

382. “That was the age of great men, doing what was right.”

— Joe Abercrombie

383. “Names turned over by time, like the plough turning the soil. Bringing up the new while the old were buried in the mud.”

— Joe Abercrombie

384. “You cannot expect all the heroes to survive a good song.”

— Joe Abercrombie

385. “Vengeance can feel fine, but it’s a luxury. It doesn’t fill your belly, or keep the rain off.”

— Joe Abercrombie

386. “Defeats do men far more good than victories.”

— Joe Abercrombie

387. “Temple grimaced, and twitched, and fidgeted with a frayed sleeve. ‘What can we do, though?’ ‘Only follow our consciences.’ Temple rounded on him angrily. ‘For a mercenary you talk a lot about conscience!’ ‘Why concern yourself unless yours bothers you?’ ‘As far as I can tell, you’re still taking Cosca’s money!’ ‘If I stopped, would you?’ Temple opened his mouth, then soundlessly shut it and scowled off at the horizon, picking at his sleeve, and picking, and picking.”

— Joe Abercrombie

388. “Dimbik had once been told that the best soldiers are rarely courageous. That was when he had been sure it was the career for him. He started to slide one hand towards his sword, far from sure what he would do with it once it reached the hilt.”

— Joe Abercrombie

389. “Pain is the best schoolmaster, as you will soon discover.”

— Joe Abercrombie

390. “Some would say the best time to cross an obstacle is when one finds oneself on the wrong side of it!”

— Joe Abercrombie

391. “But that’s war for you. An ugly business that only leaves bad men better off. Why folk insisted on singing about great warriors all the time, Rikke couldn’t have said. Why not sing about really good fishermen, or bakers, or roofers, or some other folk who actually left the world a better place, rather than heaping up corpses and setting fire to things? Was that behaviour to encourage?”

— Joe Abercrombie

392. “For a man reckoned clever, he got wedged in a lot of stupid corners.”

— Joe Abercrombie

393. “The ones you like straight away rarely turn out to be your favourites.”

— Joe Abercrombie

394. “Nothing to it. You treat folk the way you’d want to be treated, and you can’t go far wrong.”

— Joe Abercrombie

395. “She surely can cook a fight from the most peaceful ingredients. But nothing worth doing is easy. I love her in spite of it. I love her because of it. I love her.” And his face broke out in that grin again. “Every day’s a new adventure, that’s for sure.”

— Joe Abercrombie

396. “It’s a crime, when you think about how little time we get, that a man should ever be bored. When you are lying on your death bead, I expect you regret those weeks wasted more than your worst mistakes.”

— Joe Abercrombie

397. “The gods love to laugh at a happy man, however.”

— Joe Abercrombie

398. “I’m a man.” Koll’s shoulders sagged. “When did that happen?” “It just happens.” “I wish I knew what it meant, being a man.” “Guess it means something different for each one of us. The gods know I’m no sage, but if I’ve realized anything, it’s that life isn’t about making something perfect.”

— Joe Abercrombie

399. “Worry less about what the gods might do and more about what you can, that’s my advice.”

— Joe Abercrombie

400. “He tried to tell himself the dead are dead, but he knew Jenner had been right. Their ghosts stick in the minds of those that knew them, loved them, hated them. Those that killed them most of all.”

— Joe Abercrombie