But I kept at it with the help-wanted ads. My standards were sliding swiftly. At first I had insisted I would only work at a company with a mission I believed in. Then I thought maybe it would be fine as long as I was learning something new. After that I decided it just couldn't be evil. Now I was carefully delineating my personal definition of evil.

Robin Sloan

Categorized in : Long Evil Learning Something New

Walking the stacks in a library, dragging your fingers across the spines -- it's hard not to feel the presence of sleeping spirits.

Robin Sloan

library spirit sleep

Neel takes a sharp breath and I know exactly what it means. It means: I have waited my whole life to walk through a secret passage built into a bookshelf.

Robin Sloan

whole-life secret mean

I've never listened to an audiobook before, and I have to say it's a totally different experience. When you read a book, the story definitely takes place in your head. When you listen, it seems to happen in a little cloud all around it, like a fuzzy knit cap pulled down over your eyes

Robin Sloan

eye clouds book

It turns out Dungeons & Dragons is much better on paper than it is in reality.

Robin Sloan

dungeons dragons reality

He has the strangest expression on his face- the emotional equivalent of 404 PAGE NOT FOUND.

Robin Sloan

pages emotional expression

I walk alone in the darkness and wonder how a person would begin to determine the circumference of the earth. I have no idea. I’d probably just google it.

Robin Sloan

google darkness ideas

... nothing lasts long. We all come to life and gather allies and build empires and die, all in a single moment - maybe a single pulse of some giant processor somewhere.

Robin Sloan

empires giants long

I loved The Chronicles of Narnia. I loved The Chronicles of Prydain. Basically, 'Chronicles of' - I was in!

Robin Sloan

chronicles narnia

Why does the typical adventuring group consist of a wizard, a warrior, and a rogue, anyway? It should really be a wizard, a warrior, and a rich guy. Otherwise who's going to pay for all the swords and spells and hotel rooms?

Robin Sloan

warrior guy doe

Let me give you some advice: make friends with a millionaire when he's a friendless sixth-grader.

Robin Sloan

millionaire advice giving

A clerk and a ladder and warm golden light, and then: the right book exactly, at exactly the right time.

Robin Sloan

clerks light book

All the secrets of the world worth knowing are hiding in plain site.

Robin Sloan

knowing secret world

Your life must be an open city, with all sorts of ways to wander in.

Robin Sloan

cities life way

There is no immortality that is not built on friendship and work done with care. All the secrets in the world worth knowing are hiding in plain sight. It takes forty-one seconds to climb a ladder three stories tall. It's not easy to imagine the year 3012, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try. We have new capabilities now—strange powers we're still getting used to. The mountains are a message from Aldrag the Wyrm-Father. Your life must be an open city, with all sorts of ways to wander in.

Robin Sloan

knowing mean father

I'd sit at my kitchen table and start scanning help-wanted ads on my laptop, but then a browser tab would blink and I'd get distracted and follow a link to a long magazine article about genetically modified wine grapes. Too long, actually, so I'd add it to my reading list. Then I'd follow another link to a book review. I'd add the review to my reading list, too, then download the first chapter of the book—third in a series about vampire police. Then, help-wanted ads forgotten, I'd retreat to the living room, put my laptop on my belly, and read all day. I had a lot of free time.

Robin Sloan

wine reading book

This girl has the spark of life. This is my primary filter for new friends (girl- and otherwise) and the highest compliment I can pay. I've tried many times to figure out exactly what ignites it -- what cocktail of characteristics come together in the cold, dark cosmos to form a star. I know it's mostly in the face -- not just the eyes, but the brow, the cheeks, the mouth, and the micromuscles that connect them all. Kat's micromuscles are very attractive.

Robin Sloan

girl stars eye

So I guess you could say Neel owes me a few favors, except that so many favors have passed between us now that they are no longer distinguishable as individual acts, just a bright haze of loyalty. OUr friendship is a nebula. (34)

Robin Sloan

nebula favors loyalty

When every single piece of media you consume is time-shifted, does that mean it's actually you that's time-shifted?

Robin Sloan

media doe mean

If this sounds impressive to you, you’re over thirty.

Robin Sloan

thirty impressive sound

After that, the book will fade, the way all books fade in your mind. But I hope you will remember this: A man walking fast down a dark lonely street. Quick steps and hard breathing, all wonder and need. A bell above a door and the tinkle it makes. A clerk and a ladder and warm golden light, and then: the right book exactly, at exactly the right time.

Robin Sloan

lonely dark book