Beside me the monstrumologist murmured, "I believe I am in hell, therefore I am there.

— Rick Yancey

Beyond their immaculate design, the reason sharks rule the ocean is their complete indifference to everything except feeding, procreation, and defending their territory. The shark does not love. It feels no empathy. It trusts nothing. Furthermore, it lives in perfect harmony with its environment because it has no aspirations or desires. And no pity. A shark feels no sorrow, no remorse, hopes for nothing, dreams of nothing, has no illusions about itself or anything beyond itself.

— Rick Yancey

But hope is no less realistic than despair. It is still our choice whether to live in light or lie down in darkness.

— Rick Yancey

But if I'm it, the last of my kind, the last page of human history, like hell I'm going to let the story end this way. I may be the last one, but I am the one still standing. I am the one turning to face the faceless hunter in the woods on an abandoned highway. Furthermore, I am the one not running but facing. Because if I am the last one, then I am humanity. And if this is humanity's last war, then I am the battlefield.

— Rick Yancey

But the most wonderful thing of all, our highest achievement and the one thing for which I pray we will always be remembered, is stuffing wads of polyester into an anatomically incorrect, cartoonish ideal of one of nature's most fearsome predators for no other reason than to soothe a child.

— Rick Yancey

But we fall only that we might rise, Alfred. All of us fall; all of us, as you say, screw up. Falling is not important. It is how we get up after the fall that's important.

— Rick Yancey

Cassie?” It’s Sammy, holding on to Ben, because he’s feeling the Ben thing a little more than he is the Cassie one at the moment. Who’s this guy falling from the ductwork, and what’s he doing with my sister?“This must be Sammy,” Evan says.”This is Sammy,” I say. “Oh! And this is—”“Ben Parish,” Ben says.“Ben Parish?” Evan looks at me. That Ben Parish?“Ben,” I say, my face on fire. I want to laugh and crawl under the counter at the same time. “This is Evan Walker.”“Is he your boyfriend?” Sammy asks. I don’t know what to say. Ben looks totally lost, Evan completely amused, and Sammy just damned curious. It’s my first truly awkward moment in the alien lair, and I’d been through my share of moments.“He’s a friend from high school,” I mutter. And Evan corrects me, since it’s clear I’ve lost my mind. “Actually, Sam, Ben is Cassie’s friend from high school.”“She’s not my friend,” Ben says. “I mean, I guess I kind of remember her…” Then Evan’s words sink in. “How do you know who I am?”“He doesn’t!” I fairly

— Rick Yancey

Cities are more than the sum of their infrastructure. They transcend brick and mortar, concrete and steel. They're the vessels into which human knowledge is poured.

— Rick Yancey

Crazy people. They never think they're crazy. Their craziness makes perfect sense to them.

— Rick Yancey

Despair is a wholly selfish response to fortune’s slings and arrows.

— Rick Yancey