American novelist (1960- )
Lots of people don't talk about their military service.... A pretty accurate rule of thumb is the people who did the most talk about it the least. The blowhards are the ones who did squat.
DAVID BALDACCI
The Innocent
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
Even though we weren't old, we were old with all we carried inside.
DAVID BALDACCI
The Finisher
Thanks for being honest about your dishonesty.
DAVID BALDACCI
The Innocent
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
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
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
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
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
It's hard, Cotton. To let yourself love something you know you may never have.
DAVID BALDACCI
Wish You Well
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
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
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
Woe be to the wug who forgets that destroying one part of a thing does not equal victory.
DAVID BALDACCI
The Finisher
Life is what it is, Will. You take it as it comes.
DAVID BALDACCI
The Innocent
For once in a long time, he felt good. No worries, just possibilities. Endless possibilities.
DAVID BALDACCI
Absolute Power
Confidence is one thing, disrespect is quite another.
DAVID BALDACCI
The Simple Truth
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
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
Today might not be so good. But tomorrow, you got another chance to get it right.
DAVID BALDACCI
Absolute Power