Jo Nesbø

Did you know that darkness has a taste, Grandma?

Wilhelm__ smile reminded Harry of his father__ sad, resigned smile, the smile of a man looking backwards because that__ where the things that made him smile were.

...he went into the sitting room, put on a Duke Ellington record he had bought after seeing Gene Hackman sitting on the overnight bus in The Conversation to the sound of some fragile piano notes that were the loneliest Harry had ever heard.

Incidentally, I really agree with those who say that the capacity to forgive says something about the essential quality of a person. I'm the lowest grade.''I didn't mean to criticize you.''I promise to be better in my next life...

Sick is a relative concept. We__e all sick. The question is, what degree of functionality do we have with respect to the rules society sets for desirable behavior? No actions are in themselves symptoms of sickness. You have to look at the context within which these actions are performed.

No one can leave someone they have good sex with. They can try, but they always go back. We__e simple souls like that, aren__ we?

A rat is neither good nor evil. It just does what a rat is suppose to do. From Phantom

Perhaps that was a thing about attractive women: A rejection demanded their respect, made them trust you more.

With regard to power, women don__ have the vanity men have. They don__ need to make power visible, they only want the power to give them the other things they want. Security. Food. Enjoyment. Revenge. Peace. They are rational, power-seeking planners, who think beyond the battle, beyond the victory celebrations. And because they have an inborn capacity to see weakness in their victims, they know instinctively when and how to strike. And when to stop. You can__ learn that...

Harry doesn't like people, you see." "I do like people," Harry said. "I just don't like being with them. Particularly when there's a lot of them at the same time.

You are Bellman, aren__ you? The genius who sent the sauna ape after me?_ Harry nodded toward the Finn.

They had studied law, information technology and art history as part of their beauty treatment, they had let Norwegian taxpayers finance years at university just so that they could end up as overqualified, stay-at-home playthings and sit here exchanging confidences about how to keep their sugar daddies suitably happy, suitably jealous and suitably on their toes.

in order to isolate what was possible, you had to eliminate everything that was impossible

What is worse? Taking the life of a person who wants to live or taking death from a person who wants to die.

Balance is of the essence,' she said. 'That appies to all good, harmonious relationships. Balance in guilt, balance in shame and pangs of conscience.

You know someone's okay if they can ignore things they can't do anything about and move on.

Listen, I am someone who had chosen to earn their daily bread killing other people. I'm inclined to give people a bit of leeway when it comes to their actions and decisions.

Bjarne Møller, my former boss, says people like me always choose the line of most resistance. It's in what he calls our 'accursed nature'. That's why we always end up on our own. I don't know. I like being alone. Perhaps I have grown to like my self-image of being a loner, too....I think you have to find something about yourself that you like in order to survive. Some people say being alone is unsociable and selfish. But you're independent and you don't drag others down with you, if that's the way you're heading. Many people are afraid of being alone. But it made me feel strong, free and invulnerable.