When you choose an action, you choose the consequences of that action. When you desire a consequence you had damned well better take the action that would create it.

I have a catch-phrase to describe my plot-generation technique -- 'What's the worst possible thing I can do to these people?'

The most important thing about quests, he decided, was not in finding what you went looking for, but in finding what you never could have imagined before you ventured forth.

When you choose an action, you choose the consequences of that action.

When the souls rise up in glory, yours shall not be shunned nor sunderered, but shall be the prize of the gods' gardens. Even your darkness shall be treasured then, and all your pain made holy.

"It was suicide, wasn't it?" "In an involuntary sort of way," said Vorob'yev. "These Cetagandan political suicides can get awfully messy, when the principal won't cooperate." "Thirty-two stab wounds in the back, worst case of suicide they ever saw?" murmured Ivan, clearly fascinated by the gossip. "Exactly, my lord."

My dinner party,' Miles grated. 'It's just breaking up.' And sinking. All souls feared lost.