Top 100 John Flanagan Quotes
#1. It's called a sea anchor,' [Evanlyn] explained. 'It'll stop us drifting too far.'
Alyss was impressed. 'And you said you were pig-ignorant when it came to boats.'
'I don't remember saying that,' Evanlyn replied with a frown.
Alyss shrugged. 'Oh? Well, it must have been me.
John Flanagan
#2. You may believe you're an excellent rider," he called, "but there are a score of Temujai back there who actually are.
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#3. Halt sighed in exasperation. "What is it with you Araluens? Are you all afraid of a little fall?" He began hauling the rope up, coiling it over his shoulder as it came. "It's not the fall that bothers me," said Duncan. "It's the sudden stop at the end.
John Flanagan
#4. Orman nodded wearily 'As I said, when a person is unpopular, it's so easy to think badly of him
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#5. At the time, King Herbert felt that to remain safe, the kingdom needed an effective intelligence force."
"An intelligent force?" said Will.
"Not intelligent. Intelligence. Although it does help if your intelligence force was also intelligent.
John Flanagan
#6. Anything happening," she whispered.
"Aside from you blundering about like a lost elephant?" he asked, in the same low tone.
She nodded, accepting the rebuke. "Aside from that.
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#7. Failure is just a few seconds away from success.
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#8. A foolish way to get around." Hal smiled. "If the gods had meant us to ride horses, they never would have given us ships.
John Flanagan
#9. No," Hal said. "The sea is moving constantly and you have to make little adjustments to keep it going smoothly. You can't take it for granted."
"Just like a friendship," she said smiling. And Hal nodded.
"Maybe that's why the word ends in ship," he said.
John Flanagan
#10. It's a big raised platform at the end of the square, with steps running up to it."
Like a stage?" Evanlyn suggested. "Maybe they're planning to put on a play?"
Or an execution," Horace said.
John Flanagan
#11. Remember, this thing is small. It's not like the wolfships. It'll ride over the waves, not crash through them. So we're safe as houses.
He wasn't sure about the last two statements, but they seemed logical to him.
John Flanagan
#12. Remember no one expects you to be Halt. He's a legend, after all. Haven't you heard? He's eight feet tall and kills bears with his bare hands ...
John Flanagan
#13. You know, Gilan, sarcasm isn't the lowest form of wit. It's not even wit at all.
John Flanagan
#14. The sun was trembling on the brink of the world, the shadows at their longest, and they still had several kilometers to go.
John Flanagan
#15. Success tended to make the unorthodox acceptable
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#16. [Will]'d barely been asleep a few minutes when Halt's voice woke him.
'Will? Are you asleep?' ...
'I was,' he said, a little indignantly. 'I'm not now.'
'Good,' Halt replied, a trifle smugly. 'Serves you right.
John Flanagan
#17. Think of a positive outcome, and
you will achieve it. Allow doubt to enter your mind, and the doubt will become self-fulfilling.
John Flanagan
#18. Oh dear, oh deary me!" Thorn said in a ridiculous falsetto voice. "What are we going to do? It's twelve big hairy guardsmen and Mahmel in a natty green hat."
It was all very well to joke about it, Hal thought, but the situation was serious.
John Flanagan
#19. You know, one of these days, I'm actually going to take offense if people keep throwing out these slurs. And then things are going to get rather ugly. When we Skandians do take offense, we do it with a battleax.
John Flanagan
#20. You're dropping the bow hand as you release," he called, although Halt certainly wasn't.
His mentor looked around, saw him, and replied pithily, "I believe your grandmother needs lessons in sucking eggs.
John Flanagan
#21. Hal answered him. "We're as sure as we can be. The guard captain said he found a ball of yellow glass. What else could it be?" Jesper shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe a ball of yellow glass?
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#22. If you only value my advice when I agree with you, you don't value it at all.
John Flanagan
#23. Halt shook his head. Frankly, he'd seen sacks of potatoes that could sit a horse better than Erak
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#24. Minds were running along similar lines. Will adjusted
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#25. Ah, Signor Halt,' he said uncertainly, 'you are making a joke, yes?'
'He is making a joke, no,' Will said. 'But he likes to think he is making a joke, yes.
John Flanagan
#26. You'd be surprised what people will believe. Usually, the bigger and the more improbable the lie, the more willing they are to believe it.
John Flanagan
#27. What are you looking at, foreigner?" the guard demanded roughly. The smile was a little unsettling. A prisoner shouldn't smile at his captors like that.
"I'm just making sure I can remember you," Gilan told him. "Never know when that might be useful.
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#28. A hundred people is rather a large handful for the four of us to take on," Malcolm pointed out. "Do you have any ideas about how we're going to handle that task?"
"Simple," Halt told him. "We'll surround them.
John Flanagan
#29. I'll be needing a bridesmaid',she said.'A tall one. That way, I'll look more petite and feminine.
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#30. Sit down, Will. There's a good fellow," he said.
"Yes, sir," replied Will, and Halt's eyebrows shot up in surprise.
"He's never called me sir," he said.
"Probably trying to get on my good side," Crowley replied.
Halt nodded savagely. "Probably.
John Flanagan
#31. Idiots, Halt muttered. If we were here to cause trouble, we could simply ride them both down
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#33. Would you trust him with your life, Halt?" Gilan interrupted, and Halt looked up at him.
"Yes," he said quietly. Gilan patted his shoulder once more.
"Then trust him with his own," he said simply.
John Flanagan
#35. Stig: 'Of course, she'll sail rings around Wolfswind,'
Hal: 'Then why didn't you tell him that?'
Stig: 'I like my head where it is.
John Flanagan
#36. Who are you, gaijin? What do you know about honor?'
'I'm called Chocho,' Will said ...
'Chocho?' Arisaka shouted, goaded beyond control. 'Butterfly? Then die, Butterfly!
John Flanagan
#37. What about you three, where are you going?"
Even before Halt answered, Will knew what he was going to say. But that didn't make it any less terrifying or blood-chilling when the words were said.
"We're going after the Kalkara.
John Flanagan
#38. Once you best a man, never gloat. Be generous and find something in his actions to praise. He won't enjoy being bested but he'll make a good face about it. Show him you appreciate it. Praise can win you a friend. Gloating will only ever make enemies.
John Flanagan
#39. Several of them were discussing this in low tones as they waited for Halt to arrive - until they realized that he was already among them. They weren't used to this. Kings were supposed to sweep into a room majestically - not suddenly appear without anyone seeing their arrival.
John Flanagan
#40. Then, marveling at the recuperative powers and endurance of the Ranger horse breed, he tightened the girths on Blaze's saddle and swung astride the bay, groaning softly as he did so. Ranger horses might recover quickly. Ranger apprentices took a little longer. It
John Flanagan
#42. Where the large bloodstain still marked the grass.
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#43. He could bear the dying, but not the disappointment.
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#44. Sometimes people can be too intellegent for their own good. Too much thinking could confuse things.
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#45. So we've written a saga," he said. "The Saga of Hal and the Heron Brotherband." "Oh Gorlog help us," Hal muttered.
John Flanagan
#46. But if we're going to kill them all, we might as well make an occasion of it."
Toshak shrugged. "Do as you wish," he said. "Occasion or not, as long as they're all dead, I'm happy.
John Flanagan
#47. Self-doubt is a disease. And if it gets out of control, it becomes self-fulfilling.
John Flanagan
#48. Of course you love her!" he'd replied. "She's been your best friend since you both could walk, and now she's grown up to be beautiful, talented, intelligent and witty. What's not to love about all that?
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#50. You should have left him to wander," Svengal said coldly. Erak looked at him, eyebrows raised.
"Would you?" he asked, and Svengal hesitated. At the end, Toshak had fought well and that counted for a lot of Skandians.
"No," he admitted.
John Flanagan
#52. My freind is the man who gives me a book I aint read.Abraham Linclion
John Flanagan
#53. It was safe to assume that the rider would be carrying a weapon of some kind. After all, there was no point in wearing half armor and going weaponless.
John Flanagan
#54. It's a lot easier to heal an
injured body than a damaged soul.
John Flanagan
#55. All we could get out of them was that they were taking us to 'Kurokuma'. We didn't know if that was a place or a person. What does it mean, by the way?'
'I'm told it's a term of great respect,' Horace said, unwilling to admit that he didn't know.
John Flanagan
#56. The Slave master named Mahmel Was a nasty kind of thug, so Stiggy dropped a rock on him and squashed him like a bug.
John Flanagan
#57. How will I ever carry out diplomatic missions without someone to throw unpleasant nobles out the window?" "I'll
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#58. What did he do? Your friend, I mean?" he asked. "He puked into his helmet," Will said. "Extensively," Horace added. The
John Flanagan
#59. Without thinking, [Will] spoke.
'Halt? Are you awake?'
'No.' The ill humor in the one-word reply was unmistakable.
'Oh. Sorry.'
'Shut up.'
He pondered whether to apologize again and decided this would go against the instruction to shut up, so remained silent.
John Flanagan
#60. If you're a ghost," he said, "we mean you no disrespect. And if you're not a ghost, tell me who you are-or you soon will be one
John Flanagan
#61. The battle, if you could call it that, lasted no more than a few seconds.
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#62. Karina and Tho-orn, sitting in a tree-ee. Kay-eye-ess-ess-eye-en-gee.
John Flanagan
#64. There are always risks in battle. It's a dangerous business. The trick is to take the right ones.' [said Halt].
'How do you know which are the right ones?' Shigeru asked.
Halt glanced at his two younger companions. They grinned and answered in chorus, 'You wait and see if you win.
John Flanagan
#65. You're not built for riding, either," Horace added. "I'd say more saddle sore than homesick."
Svenal sighed ruefully, shifting his buttocks for the twentieth time to find a more comfortable spot.
"It's true," he said. "I've been discovering parts of my backside I never knew existed.
John Flanagan
#66. You're right, Halt,' she said, and he nodded acklowledgement of her backing down.
'Nice to hear someone else saying that for a change,' Will said cheerfully. 'Seems like I've said those words an awful lot in my time.'
Halt turned a bleak gaze on him. 'And you've always been right.
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#67. She knew more about these situations than she realized, he thought. She'd spent years at Duncan's side. "When in doubt," he added, "be pompous.
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#68. I will remember this word," he said. "Shenanigans. It is a good word.
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#69. Now I know that if you wait until you think you are ready, you'll wait your whole life
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#70. Don't concentrate on the obvious. They might want you to miss something else.
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#71. Never take your eyes off them," Horace said to Gilan, in an admonishing tone. "Didn't MacNeil ever tell you that?
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#72. Doesn't matter which is which," he said cheerfully. "They're both idiots.
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#73. If everything is done for me ... how will I ever learn?
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#74. They have terrified my poor wife and threatened my very person!"
Halt eyed the man impassivley until the outburst was finished.
Worse than that," he said quietly, "they've wasted my time.
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#75. My leg hurts," the soldier whined.
"Of course it does," Halt told him. "I put an arrow through it. Did you expect it not to hurt?
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#76. The young gentleman is correct," he said.
Halt raised an eyebrow. "He may be correct, and he is undoubtedly young. But he's no gentleman."
~Halt and General Sapristi speaking of Will
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#77. Although it does help if your intelligence force is also intelligent.
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#78. You're a dead man, Arratay," Jerrel said through clenched teeth.
Halt smiled. "That's been said before. Yet here I am.
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#79. Very impressive. Where did you learn that?
Made it up just now.
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#80. Let's face it, she can't have simply disappeared ... can she?"
Horace shrugged. "That's what I keep telling myself," he said morosley. "But somehow it looks as if she has.
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#81. Will was worth at least a few tears from a grizzled old wreck like himself, he thought, and made no move to wipe them away.
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#82. Does your friend ever say anything?' the fat man asked. Aloom set down the piece of bread he had just rolled round several chunks of meat and gave an exasperated sigh.
'I heard him say oops! once, when he cut the ears off someone who was asking too many questions.
John Flanagan
#83. Neither boy ever intended to speak about the events at the cliff that day. But of course their mothers eventually worked the truth out of them. Mothers always do.
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#84. Nothing like a little wanton destruction to get boys excited, Thorn thought, smiling to himself.
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#85. Face your fears, Halt had always thought him, and more often than not they fade like mist in the sunshine
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#86. There's nothing honerable in a man who hides behind a blue woman's hanky.
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#87. I don't snore," Horace said, with dignity. Will raised his eyebrows."Is that so?" he said. "Then in that case, you'd better chase out that colony of walruses who are in the tent with you.
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#88. Sometimes, he thought, all you could do was wait.
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#89. The sarcastic little know-it-all needs help, does he?
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#90. Halt Halt, said Gilan stepping out into the open.
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#91. He'd just have to lie there and die, watched over by strange stars who didn't know him, didn't care for him. It was very sad, really.
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#92. He shook his head. He didn't know. He couldn't tell when he had woken fully. He walked to the horses. They definitely seemed alarmed. But then, they would. After all, he had just leapt to his feet unexpectedly, waving his saxe knife around like a lunatic.
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#93. What is this Chocho business?' Will muttered to himself. But his friends overheard the comment.
'It's a term of great respect,' they chorused, and he glared at them.
'Oh, shut up,' he said.
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#94. But ... what if I mistime it?"
Gilan smiled widely. "Well, in that case, I'll probably lop your head off your shoulders."
Horace and Gilan
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#95. true authority came from sharing the hard work, not attempting to place oneself above it.
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#96. Always expect trouble in the desert. Then you usually won't meet it.
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#97. Now," said Halt, "all I have to do is work out a way of beating these horse-riding devils."
Erak grinned at him. "That should be child's play," he said. "The hard part will be convincing Ragnak about it.
John Flanagan
#98. I said you were Sir Horace of the Order of the Oakleaf," Halt told him, then added uncertainly, "At least, I think that's what I told him. I may have said you were of the Order of the Oak Pancake." Horace
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#99. You can always win points; winning people's respect is a lot more important.
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#100. Come closer, Kurokuma. It's quite safe.'
Horace shuffled closer to the edge ...
'Quite safe, my foot,' he muttered to himself. 'And what's this Kurokuma you keep calling me?'
'It's a term of great respect,' Shigeru told him.
'Great respect,' Shukin echoed.
John Flanagan
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