Top 450 Louise Penny Quotes (2025 Update)
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301. “But he was a thirty-nine-year-old black man. He’d been stopped so many times by the cops, he’d stopped counting. They’d had to train their fourteen-year-old son, from the time he could walk, how to behave when stopped by the cops. When harassed. When targeted. When pushed and provoked. Don’t react. Move slowly. Show your hands. Be polite, do as you’re asked. Don’t react.”

— Louise Penny

302. “Olivier looked at him blankly. But the Chief Inspector had seen that look before. It was, in fact, almost impossible to look blank. Unless the person wanted to. A blank face to the Chief Inspector meant a frantic mind.”

— Louise Penny

303. “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

304. “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

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

— Louise Penny

306. “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

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

— Louise Penny

308. “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

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

— Louise Penny

310. “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

311. “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

312. “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

313. “I don’t know. I was wrong. I’m sorry.” Lacoste recited them slowly, lifting a finger to count them off. “I need help,” the Chief said, completing the statements. The ones he’d taught young Agent Lacoste many years ago. The ones he’d recited to all his new agents.”

— Louise Penny

314. “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

315. “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

316. “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

317. “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

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

— Louise Penny

319. “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

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

— Louise Penny

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

— Louise Penny

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

— Louise Penny

323. “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

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

— Louise Penny

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

— Louise Penny

326. “She wasn’t afraid to be wrong. And that, the Chief knew, was a great strength.”

— Louise Penny

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

— Louise Penny

328. “Dreadful deeds were obvious. The divine was often harder to see.”

— Louise Penny

329. “Gabri plugged the oven and the espresso machine into the generator,’ explained Olivier. ‘No lights, but we have the necessities.”

— Louise Penny

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

— Louise Penny

331. “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

332. “He stared for ten seconds or more, which, when eating a chocolate cake isn’t much, but when staring, is.”

— Louise Penny

333. “They had such a profound effect on those who sang and heard them that the ancient chants became known as “the beautiful mystery.”

— Louise Penny

334. “I’m saying people change.” She held up her hands to ward off Clara’s protests. “I know, it’s easy to say. And it doesn’t undo the damage. But we’ve seen changes of heart. Changes of perception. It happens. Racists, homophobes, misogynists, they can change. And some do.” “Truth and reconciliation,” said Clara. “Yes. The truth must come first. And then, maybe, reconciliation. Maybe.”

— Louise Penny

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

— Louise Penny

336. “Maybe that’s what old men are for. To make decisions that no young man can.” He was watching Gamache closely. “Or should have to.”

— Louise Penny

337. “Homes, Gamache knew, were a self-portrait. A person’s choice of color, furnishing, pictures.”

— Louise Penny

338. “The morning after their deaths, Armand had gone into their room. The scent of them, the sense of them, almost too much to bear. The clothing. The book. The bookmark. The bedside clock, still ticking. He’d thought that strange. Surely it should have stopped.”

— Louise Penny

339. “There is no way either would get into their wedding clothes. But they’d grown in other ways as well, and Gamach figured it was a good deal. If life meant growth in all directions, it was fine with him.”

— Louise Penny

340. “I’ve seen enough successful writers who no longer seem to care when they are recognized with an award, and I think that’s just tragic.”

— Louise Penny

341. “Yes, the real danger always came from the thing you couldn’t see.”

— Louise Penny

342. “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

343. “But they both knew that words were weapons too, and when fashioned into a story their power was almost limitless.”

— Louise Penny

344. “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

345. “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

346. “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

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

— Louise Penny

348. “But he also knew praying was more to steady the person than inform the deity.”

— Louise Penny

349. “He often said that words told them what someone was thinking, but the tone told them how they felt.”

— Louise Penny

350. “Why were there no words that felt? Words that when you touched them you’d feel what was intended? The chasm left by the loss of Madeleine? The lump in the throat that fizzed and ached. The terror of falling asleep knowing that on waking she’d relive the loss, like Prometheus bound and tormented each day. Everything had changed. Even her grammar. Suddenly she lived in the past tense. And the singular.”

— Louise Penny