DAVID BALDACCI QUOTES IV

American novelist (1960- )

She noticed a shadow of movement behind her, but had no chance to feel alarmed about it. That was Betsy Puller Simon's last memory.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Forgotten

Tags: chance


Very few people knew I was writing during those years: my mom and dad, my brother and sister, my wife. That was it. Not even my in-laws knew. It was a very personal thing for me I was pursuing. My wife obviously was very instrumental. We had a family, and she took on more of the labor of that, allowing me to write at night, early in the morning, and on the weekends. My mom and dad obviously instilled the love of reading in all three of us siblings; we went to the library every weekend and checked out lots of books. But for my love of books, I wouldn’t have ended up being a writer. But I could open a book and explore different parts of the world without ever leaving the city where I grew up. It was a fascinating thing, and I became mesmerized by the power of language. That’s really what started it for me.

DAVID BALDACCI

interview, The Strand

Tags: books


Thanks for being honest about your dishonesty.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Innocent


I love my country. It is a place of beauty. The people there are good. They like to work hard. They love their freedoms. But that does not mean that every leader we have is a good one who deserves the respect of the people. So sometimes when you do not follow along blindly things happen to you.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Forgotten

Tags: love


Sometimes inspiration hits in the middle of the night and I want to get up and work on it. It’s that spark of immediacy. For me, it’s a tap which is on all the time.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Telegraph, November 16, 2015

Tags: inspiration


It's my experience that most folk who ride trains could care less where they're going. For them it's the journey itself and the people they meet along the way. You see, at every stop this train makes, a little bit of America, a little bit of your country, gets on and says hello.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Christmas Train

Tags: America


Small mistakes tend to lead to large ones. Ours is a lifetime appointment, and all you have is your reputation. Once it's gone, it doesn't come back.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Simple Truth

Tags: mistakes


Most folks here got rules 'bout trespassing. Warning shot's fired right close to the head. Get they's attention. Next shot gets a lot more personal.

DAVID BALDACCI

Wish You Well

Tags: rules


King heard the bang, like the sound of a dropped book. He could feel the moisture on his hand where it had touched Ritter's back. And now the moisture wasn't just sweat. His hand stung where the slug had come out of the body and taken a chunk off his middle finger before hitting the wall behind him. As Ritter dropped, King felt like a comet flying hell-bent and still taking a billion light-years to get where it's actually going.

DAVID BALDACCI

Split Second

Tags: Hell


I want people to realize wars could be fought in many different types of battlefields whether the desert in Iraq or the urban streets of London or America. These are two very different kinds of battlefields. Because many citizens have no direct engagement with the soldiers and their families they think they could not be harmed. We are never really safe wherever we are. It is an important cliché, ‘see something, say something.’ People should not be listening to their ear buds or staring at their phones oblivious to everyone around them.

DAVID BALDACCI

interview, Crime Spree Magazine, November 14, 2017

Tags: America


As a lawyer, I was paid to write persuasively. I was paid to take the same set of facts the other side had and make you believe that my version of it was true, while the other side was doing the exact same thing.

DAVID BALDACCI

interview, The Strand

Tags: facts


Woe be to the wug who forgets that destroying one part of a thing does not equal victory.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Finisher

Tags: victory


It's hard, Cotton. To let yourself love something you know you may never have.

DAVID BALDACCI

Wish You Well

Tags: love


For once in a long time, he felt good. No worries, just possibilities. Endless possibilities.

DAVID BALDACCI

Absolute Power

Tags: time


Confidence is one thing, disrespect is quite another.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Simple Truth


Ignorance and intolerance to be like commas, because you often found them in pairs, and almost never did you find one, ignorance, without its evil twin, intolerance.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Camel Club

Tags: evil


Life is what it is, Will. You take it as it comes.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Innocent


She had spent considerable time writing the letter. The younger generation, with all of its tweets and Facebook and cryptic texts and emails where no actual language or grammar were involved, would never have understood taking the time.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Forgotten

Tags: time


All you have to do is spend your life running from one awful place to another, write about every horrible thing you see. The civilized world reads about it, then forgets it, but pats you on the head for doing it and gives you a reward as appreciation for changing nothing.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Christmas Train

Tags: life


Like a spreading pandemic, the video ignited a maelstrom worldwide. From blog to blog, chat room to chat room, e-mail to e-mail, the story passed. With each retelling it grew in proportion until the globe was in apparent jeopardy of being overrun at any moment by crazy, bloodthirsty Russians. Within three days after Konstantin's sad proclamation, the world rang with his name. Soon half the earth's population, including many who had no idea who the U.S. president or the pope was, knew all about the dead Russian.

DAVID BALDACCI

The Whole Truth