Quotes by Michael Connelly

What is important is not what you hear said, its what you observe.

You know what I did after I wrote my first novel? I shut up and wrote twenty-three more.)

Money. The ultimate motivation. The ultimate way of keeping score.

You know what my father said about innocent clients? ... He said the scariest client a lawyer will ever have is an innocent client. Because if you fuck up and he goes to prison, itll scar you for life ... He said there is no in-between with an innocent client. No negotiation, no plea bargain, no middle ground. Theres only one verdict. You have to put an NG up on the scoreboard. Theres no other verdict but not guilty.Levin nodded thoughtfully.The bottom line was my old man was a damn good lawyer and he didnt like having innocent clients, I said. Im not sure I do, either.

All his life Harry Bosch believed he had a mission. And to carry out that mission he needed to be bulletproof. He needed to build himself and his life so that he was invulnerable, so that nothing and no one could ever get to him. All of that changed on the day he was introduced to the daughter he didn’t know he had. In that moment he knew he was both saved and lost. He would be forever connected to the world in the way only a father knew.- Nine Dragons by Michael Connelly

Los Angeles was the kind of place where everybody was from somewhere else and nobody really droppped anchor. It was a transient place. People drawn by the dream, people running from the nightmare. Twelve million people and all of them ready to make a break for it if necessary. Figuratively, literally, metaphorically -- any way you want to look at it -- everbody in L.A. keeps a bag packed. Just in case.

The gravel road widened into a large turnaround where three similar looking and designed brothels sat waiting for customers. They were called Sheilas Front Porch, Tawnys High Five Ranch and Miss Delilahs House of Holies.Nice, Rachel said as we surveyed the scene. why are these places always named after women -- as if women actually own them?You got me. I guess Mister Daves House of Holies wouldnt go over so well with the guys.Rachel smiled.Youre right. I guess its a shrewd move. Name a place of female degradation and slavery after a female and it doesnt sound so bad, does it? Its packaging.

There was polite laughter in the courtroom. Bosch noticed that the attorneys -- prosecution and defense -- dutifully joined in, a couple of them overdoing it. It had been his experience that while in open court a judge could not possibly tell a joke that the lawyers did not laugh at.

The Strip was still lit by a million neon lights, though the crowds on the sidewalk had greatly decreased by this hour. Still, Bosch was awed by the spectacle of light. In every imaginable color and configuration, it was a megawatt funnel of enticement to greed that burned twenty-four hours a day. Bosch felt the same attraction that all the other grinders felt tug at them. Las Vegas was like one of the hookers on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Even happily married men at least glanced their way, if only for a second, just to get an idea what was out there, maybe give them something to think about. Las Vegas was like that. There was a visceral attraction here. The bold promise of money and sex. But the first was a broken promise, a mirage, and the second was fraught with danger, expense, physical and mental risk. It was where the real gambling took place in this town.

Hidden Highlands was maybe a little richer but not that different from many of the other small, wealthy and scared enclaves nestled in the hills and valleys around Los Angeles. Walls and gates, guardhouses and private security forces were the secret ingredients of the so-called melting pot of southern California.

There were a billion lights out there on the horizon and I knew that all of them put together werent enough to light the darkness in the hearts of some men.

There is a means to every end. A root to any cause. Sometimes the root is more evil than any cause, though its the cause that is usually most vilified.

Im relaxed, Belk. I call it Zen and the art of not giving a shit.

He [Harry Bosch] defined good company not by the conversation but by the lack of it. When there was no need to talk to feel comfortable, that was the right company

You don’t like what you see out your window, you put up a wall.

Trust no one. You may be working with the last honest cop in Mexicali, but why bet your life on it?

All his life Bosch had lived and worked in society’s institutions. But he hope he had escaped institutional thinking, that he made his own decisions.

I have waited twenty years for this phone call . . . and all this time I thought it would go away. I knew I would always be sad for my sister. But I thought the other would go away.” “What is the other, Henrik?” Though he knew the answer. “Anger . . . I am still angry, Detective Bosch.” Bosch nodded. He looked down at his desk, at the photos of all the victims under the glass top. Cases and faces. His eyes moved from the photo of Anneke Jespersen to some of the others. The ones he had not yet spoken for. “So am I, Henrik,” he said. “So am I.”- The Burning Room by Michael Connelly

Well, did he do it?She always asked the irrelevant question. It didnt matter in terms of the strategy of the case whether the defendant did it or not. What mattered was the evidence against him -- the proof -- and if and how it could be neutralized. My job was to bury the proof, to color the proof a shade of gray. Gray was the color of reasonable doubt.

Thats justice, she said, nodding at the statue. She doesnt hear you. She doesnt see you. She cant feel you and wont speak to you. Justice, Detective Bosch, is just a concrete blonde.