Top 450 Louise Penny Quotes (2024 Update)
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301. “But they both knew that words were weapons too, and when fashioned into a story their power was almost limitless.”

— Louise Penny

302. “Rules meant order. Without them they’d be killing each other. It began with butting in, with parking in disabled spaces, with smoking in elevators. And it ended in murder.”

— Louise Penny

303. “It was no use telling her he understood. Or that it was all right. She’d earned the right to no easy answer.”

— Louise Penny

304. “Gamache was the best of them, the smartest and bravest and strongest because he was willing to go into his own head alone, and open all the doors there, and enter all the dark rooms. And make friends with what he found there. And he went into the dark, hidden rooms in the minds of others. The minds of killers. And he faced down whatever monsters came at him. He went to places Beauvoir had never even dreamed existed.”

— Louise Penny

305. “Friend of Bill was code. For a member of AA. Of which this Anton was clearly one. It was like finding a member of his tribe, unexpectedly. The two men stood in the warm kitchen, the sleet hitting the windows, and realized that while they knew nothing about each other, they actually knew each other better than almost anyone else on earth.”

— Louise Penny

306. “The world turned upside down,′ Beauvoir continued. ‘It was at once more beautiful and more frightening than you’d been led to believe. And suddenly you didn’t know what to do. Who to trust. Where to turn. It’s terrifying. Being lost is so much worse than being on the wrong road. That’s why people stay on it for so long.”

— Louise Penny

307. “Recruiters, for terrorist cells and police forces and armies, relied on this simple truth: if you got people young enough, they could be made to do just about anything.”

— Louise Penny

308. “We knew who would want him found, Dr Croix, but who wants him to remain buried?”

— Louise Penny

309. “The reason “belonging” was so potent, so attractive, so much a part of the human yearning, was that it also meant safety, and loyalty. If you were “one of us” you were protected.”

— Louise Penny

310. “And fear. High school smelled of that more than anything else, even more than sweaty feet, cheap perfume and rotten bananas.”

— Louise Penny

311. “He remembered how it felt to find himself in the library, away from possible attack but surrounded by things far more dangerous than what roamed the school corridors. For here thoughts were housed.”

— Louise Penny

312. “It seemed Yolande had become so self-absorbed she no longer existed. She’d finally absorbed herself.”

— Louise Penny

313. “They are four sentences we learn to say, and mean.’ Gamache held up his hand as a fist and raised a finger with each point. ‘I don’t know. I need help. I’m sorry. And one other.’ Gamache thought for a moment but couldn’t bring it to mind.”

— Louise Penny

314. “In Beauvoir’s experience Darwin was way wrong. The fittest didn’t survive, they were killed by the idiocy of their neighbors, who continued to bumble along oblivious.”

— Louise Penny

315. “If ever two men were made for cahoots, it was these two. They were cahootites.”

— Louise Penny

316. “After more than a thousand years,” he continued, “an enemy finally broke through. Not because of superior firepower. Not because the Manchus were better fighters or strategists. They weren’t. The Manchus breached the Great Wall and took Beijing because someone opened a gate. From the inside. As simple as that. A general, a traitor, let them in and an empire fell.”

— Louise Penny

317. “What people do for power. How they’re willing to mutilate themselves, physically, intellectually, morally, for power and position.”

— Louise Penny

318. “Entitlement was, she knew, a terrible thing. It chained the person to their victimhood. It gobbled up all the air around it. Until the person lived in a vacuum, where nothing good could flourish.”

— Louise Penny

319. “Far greater than Gamache’s anger was his caring.”

— Louise Penny

320. “Armand stood up, still holding Stephen’s hand, and said, “It’s time. Let him go.” Then he sat back down, his legs weak. If this was the right thing to do, why did it feel so wrong? But no, it didn’t feel wrong. It felt wretched. Horrific. A nightmare. But sometimes “right” felt like that.”

— Louise Penny

321. “What killed people wasn’t a bullet, a blade, a fist to the face. What killed people was a feeling. Left too long. Sometimes in the cold, frozen. Sometimes buried and fetid. And sometimes on the shores of a lake, isolated. Left to grow old, and odd.”

— Louise Penny

322. “Where once his grandparents put up crucifixes and images of the benediction on their walls, he and Reine-Marie put up books on theirs. History books. Reference books. Biographies. Fiction, nonfiction. Stories lined the walls and both insulated them from the outside world and connected them to it.”

— Louise Penny

323. “My favorite quote from Thoreau is also from Walden,” said Gamache. “A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone.”

— Louise Penny

324. “When Peter walked into a room he always swept it until he found Clara. And then he relaxed.”

— Louise Penny

325. “Clara rocked back and forth, back and forth, cradling her loss. Earlier in the day she’d felt someone had scooped her heart and her brain right out of her body. Now they were back, but they were broken. Her brain jumped madly about the place, but always back to that one scorched spot.”

— Louise Penny

326. “At my age I’ve long since stopped caring what others think.”

— Louise Penny

327. “Good hearts get hurt. Good hearts get broken, Armand. And then they lash out.”

— Louise Penny

328. “I often think we should have tattooed on the back of whatever hand we use to shoot or write, “I might be wrong.”

— Louise Penny

329. “Not everyone makes the boat, she thought.”

— Louise Penny

330. “Gamache had asked not because he didn’t know the answer, but because he wanted to see if Peter would lie to him. He had. And if he’d lie about that, what else had he lied about?”

— Louise Penny

331. “It was like walking into joy.”

— Louise Penny

332. “But I understand your doubts. They’re what make you a great man, not your certainties.”

— Louise Penny

333. “All will be as it should, if we just do our best.”

— Louise Penny

334. “Everyday for Lucy’s entire dog life Jane had sliced a banana for breakfast and had miraculously dropped one of the perfect disks on to the floor where it sat for an instant before being gobbled up. Every morning Lucy’s prayers were answered, confirming her belief that God was old and clumsy and smelt like roses and lived in the kitchen. But no more. Lucy knew her God was dead. And she now knew the miracle wasn’t the banana, it was the hand that offered the banana.”

— Louise Penny

335. “It’s like drinking acid,” said Myrna, “and expecting the other person to die.” Gamache nodded.”

— Louise Penny

336. “Some so weighty we carry them our whole lives. They can blight our very existence, or they can make us stronger. They can make us bitter or teach us compassion. They can drive us to do things we never thought ourselves capable of. Wonderful achievements, like becoming Chief Inspector and Commander. Or horrific things. Terrible dark deeds.”

— Louise Penny

337. “Things were pretty dire when Ruth was the healing agent.”

— Louise Penny

338. “Since when do rabbits have eggs?’ Ruth persisted, looking at the bewildered villagers. ‘Never thought of that, eh? Where did it get them? Presumably from chocolate chickens. The bunny must have stolen the eggs from candy chickens who’re searching for their babies. Frantic.”

— Louise Penny

339. “Photos sat on the piano and shelves bulged with books, testament to a life well lived.”

— Louise Penny

340. “Myrna understood how damaging it was to compare pain. To dismiss hurt just because it wasn’t the worst.”

— Louise Penny

341. “But he knew he needn’t worry. This man was afraid of nothing. “I count my blessings.” He turned and saw Irene on the terrasse, as though he’d sensed her there. “We’re all blessed and we’re all blighted, Chief Inspector,” said Finney. “Every day each of us does our sums. The question is, what do we count?” The old man brought his hand to his head and removed his hat, offering it to Gamache.”

— Louise Penny

342. “Most of us are great with change, as long as it was our idea.”

— Louise Penny

343. “She was stuffing her innards back. Sewing herself up, putting her skin, her make-up, her party frock back on.”

— Louise Penny

344. “They’re angry. Unstable. And no doubt armed.”

— Louise Penny

345. “As a good rule of thumb, if you have to lie, you might be doing something wrong.”

— Louise Penny

346. “We can all fall,” said the abbot. “But perhaps not as hard and not as fast and not as far as someone who spends his life on the ascent.”

— Louise Penny

347. “Their creations eventually die of neglect, of malnourishment. And sometimes, when that happens the artist also dies.”

— Louise Penny

348. “Rummaging through the cupboard like a wartime surgeon frantically searching for the right bandage, Peter swept aside Yogi Tea and Harmony Herbal Blend, though he hesitated for a second over chamomile. But no. Stay focused, he admonished himself. He knew it was there, that opiate of the Anglos. And his hand clutched the box just as the kettle whistled. Violent death demanded Earl Grey.”

— Louise Penny

349. “Clara tried to give the eulogy, but couldn’t speak. Her words stuck at the lump in her throat. And so Myrna took over, holding her hand while Clara stood beside her.”

— Louise Penny

350. “Hope offered, then denied. A particular cruelty.”

— Louise Penny