Brandon Sanderson Quotes

You trusted me enough to jump off the wall, and I caught you.

~ Brandon Sanderson

In a way, she'd rather trust him and be wrong than deal with the worry of mistrust.

~ Brandon Sanderson

I can't worry about everything at once, Elend thought with determination. I just have to trust. Trust in myself and keep going.

~ Brandon Sanderson

I trust you with their lives,' Prof said, still writing, 'and them with yours. Don't betray that trust, son. Keep your impulses in check. Don't just act because you can; act because it's the right thing to do. If you keep that in mind, you'll be all right.

~ Brandon Sanderson

She would always love him. But she would not cease to function because he was gone

~ Brandon Sanderson

He actually did it, didn't he? Marsh said, shaking his head in wonder. That bastard. There are two things I'll never forgive him for. The first is for stealing my dream of overthrowing the Final Empire, then actually succeeding at it.Vin paused. And the second?Marsh turned spike-heads towards her. Getting himself killed to do it.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Before the Wright brothers flew, flying was fantasy. Before the civil rights movement, people getting along together and the races being equal was a fantasy. Things change because we imagine a different world, a world that is not. And I think that imagination is one of the most important and defining aspects of human existence: our ability to imagine a world that is not.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Remember why we live. Remember warmth, remember good food. Remember friends, and song, and evenings spent around the hearth.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Everything is a contest. All dealings among men are a contest in which some will succeed and others fail. And some are failing quite spectacularly.

~ Brandon Sanderson

If men should read these words, let them know that power is a heavy burden. Seek not to be bound by its chains.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Magic works best for me when it aligns with scientific principles.

~ Brandon Sanderson

When I finally lie down, I find sleep elusive. The same thoughts that trouble me during the day are only compounded by the stillness of night.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Somehow in the chaos and mess she'd discovered who she was. Not a girl of the streets, though that was where she'd been raised. Not a woman of the court, though she appreciated the beauty and the grace of the balls. Someone else. Someone she liked.

~ Brandon Sanderson

You want to be competent? she thought. You want to learn to be in control of what goes on around you, rather than just being pushed around? Then you’ll have to learn to deal with failure.

~ Brandon Sanderson

There was no correcting past mistakes, especially since he could see no real 'mistakes' he had made. He had done the best he could, and that had proven insufficient.

~ Brandon Sanderson

I let out a sound that was definitely not a whimper. It was something far more manly, no matter what it sounded like.

~ Brandon Sanderson

He didn’t recruit me,” Cett pointed out. “I got pulled by my balls into this little fiasco.”“I wish I cared enough to apologize,” Elend said, staring at them.

~ Brandon Sanderson

And are you going to explain why you consider competing with me to be the most sincere form of compliment?” “Of course I am,” Lightsong said. “My dear, have you ever known me to make an inflammatorily ridiculous statement without providing an equally ridiculous explanation to substantiate it?” “Of course not,” she agreed. “You are nothing if not exhaustive in your self-congratulatory made-up logic.” “I am rather exceptional in that regard.

~ Brandon Sanderson

If we stop helping people because we’re afraid, or ambivalent or whatever, then we lose. Let them do evil. I’ll stop them.

~ Brandon Sanderson

If you can read the book and say, ‘Space Marines, YEEEAAAHHH!’ That’s Military Science Fiction.” (Brigham Young writing lecture, March 2012)

~ Brandon Sanderson

Books have great value, actions have greater value.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Those dear to me took fright for my safety and, perhaps, my sanity. Kings, they explained, do not walk like beggars for hundreds of miles. My response was that if a beggar could managed the feat, then why not a king? Did they think me less capable than a beggar?Sometimes I think that I am. The beggar knows much that the king can only guess. And yet who draws up the codes for begging ordinances? Often I wonder what my experience in life--my easy life following the Desolation, and my current level of comfort--has given me of any true experience to use in making laws. If we had to rely on what we knew, kings would only be of use in creating laws regarding the proper heating of tea and the cushioning of thrones.

~ Brandon Sanderson

I didn't have all the answers, but at least I had a goal. Revenge. Who cared if it would eat me up inside and leave me hollow?

~ Brandon Sanderson

Do not let your assumptions about a culture block your ability to perceive the individual, or you will fail.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Oh,” Obliteration continued, “I think that you’ll find a man can do many things thought impossible, if he tries hard enough.

~ Brandon Sanderson

The rest of the time, I don't do so much thinkin'. 'Cuz if I did, I'd go runnin' back to where things is simple.

~ Brandon Sanderson

The rest of the time, I don't do so much thinkin'. 'Cuz if I did, I'd go running back to where things is simple. You see?

~ Brandon Sanderson

I need something, Wax. A place to look. You always did the thinking.”“Yes, having a brain helps with that, surprisingly.

~ Brandon Sanderson

The truth is, most people who do what you'd call 'wrong' do it for what they call 'right' reasons.

~ Brandon Sanderson

People today...it seems they are good, or sometimes evil, mostly by inertia, not by choice.

~ Brandon Sanderson

The only time you seem honest is when you’re insulting someone!”“The only honest things I can say to you are insults.

~ Brandon Sanderson

I don't want to make people mad. I just... well, how can people get better if you don't tell them what you honestly think?

~ Brandon Sanderson

It’s not a lie,” Shallan said, “if everyone understands and knows what it means.”“Mm. Those are some of the best lies.

~ Brandon Sanderson

light makes shadow. Truth makes lies.

~ Brandon Sanderson

Stealing regular stuff was no fun. She wanted a real challenge. Over the last two years, she'd picked the most difficult places to enter. Then she'd snuck in.And eaten their dinners.

~ Brandon Sanderson

I'm an expert on one-armed Herdazian jokes. 'Lopen,' my mother always says, 'you must learn these to laugh before others do. Then you steal the laughter from them, and have it all for yourself.

~ Brandon Sanderson

I froze, shocked. (And don't try to claim that you did anything different the first time a government bureaucrat pulled a gun on you.)

~ Brandon Sanderson

It seems that the rebels found the chaos of transition more difficult to accept than the tyranny they had known before. They joyfully welcomed back authority-even oppressive authority-for it was less painful for them than uncertainty.

~ Brandon Sanderson

What was the purpose, then, of everything they taught in here? If it couldn't prevent men from acting like monsters?

~ Brandon Sanderson

Is human nature to believe that other places and other times are better than the here and now.

~ Brandon Sanderson