405 Quotes by Jeff VanderMeer

This machine or creature or some combination of both that can manipulate molecules, that can store energy where it will, that can hide the bulk of its intent and its machinations from us. That lives with angels within it and with the vestiges of its own terroir, the hints of its homeland, to which it can never return because it no longer exists.

We live in a universe driven by chance,” his father had said once, “but the bullshit artists all want causality.

Others among them lay out under the stars at night and recorded their dreams as if they were transmissions from beyond. As a kind of fiction, it enlivened my reading but was otherwise worthless.

Do you think Area X builds spaceships, too? Do you think Area X traverses interstellar space? Wormholes? Think of something more subtle, something peering through what we think of as reality.

...your antagonist is a hero in their own mind... p.192

Agency in fiction has to exist in the context of the worldview. Otherwise agency is not just meaningless or unconvincing, it is often laughable. Unfortunately, agency is often thoughtlessly given to characters who would not have it in reality. p.189

Think about how backstory fits the tale you're trying to tell... p.195

He drank deeply from his orange juice - really drank to savor it so that for a minute or two nothing existed in the house but his enjoyment.

They’d never really been my friends; I didn’t cultivate friends, I had just inherited them from my husband.