"Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you."
~ B.A. Paris
Read all great B.A. Paris quotes below ...
>
In the realm of psychological thrillers, few names evoke as much intrigue and anticipation as B.A. Paris. With a knack for crafting spine-chilling narratives that keep readers on the edge of their seats, Paris has emerged as a powerhouse in the world of suspense fiction, captivating audiences with her spellbinding tales of deception and betrayal.
Born and raised in England, B.A. Paris harbored a lifelong passion for storytelling. After studying literature and pursuing a career in finance, Paris found herself drawn back to her first love: writing. It was this convergence of passion and talent that laid the foundation for her remarkable literary career.
Paris burst onto the literary scene with her debut novel, "Behind Closed Doors," a gripping tale of domestic suspense that garnered widespread acclaim and catapulted her to international recognition. The novel's runaway success established Paris as a formidable force in the genre, paving the way for a series of bestselling thrillers that would captivate readers around the globe.
While "Behind Closed Doors" remains a standout success, Paris has continued to enthrall audiences with a string of equally compelling novels, including "The Breakdown," "Bring Me Back," and "The Dilemma." Each book showcases Paris's mastery of suspenseful storytelling, weaving intricate plots filled with twists and turns that keep readers guessing until the very end.
However, it is perhaps Paris's latest offering, "The Guests," that has generated the most buzz among fans and critics alike. Released to critical acclaim, this atmospheric thriller transports readers to a secluded island retreat, where dark secrets and hidden agendas threaten to unravel the lives of its unsuspecting inhabitants. With its taut pacing and expertly crafted suspense, "The Guests" reaffirms Paris's reputation as a preeminent voice in the genre.
Beyond her literary achievements, B.A. Paris has garnered numerous accolades and awards for her contributions to the world of suspense fiction. Her books have topped bestseller lists around the world and have been translated into multiple languages, further solidifying her status as a global sensation.
What sets Paris apart from her contemporaries is her ability to delve deep into the intricacies of the human psyche, crafting characters that are as complex as they are compelling. Her prose is sharp and incisive, drawing readers into a labyrinth of deceit and deception where nothing is as it seems.
Readers are drawn to B.A. Paris's work for its relentless tension, heart-pounding suspense, and jaw-dropping twists. Her novels offer a thrilling escape from the ordinary, inviting readers to immerse themselves in a world where danger lurks around every corner and the truth is never what it seems.
For those seeking a gripping read that will keep them guessing until the very end, B.A. Paris's books are a must-read. With their clever plotting, memorable characters, and spine-tingling suspense, they are guaranteed to leave readers breathless and craving more.
Currently, Paris is hard at work on her next thrilling novel, promising readers another captivating journey into the depths of suspense and intrigue. To stay updated on her latest releases and behind-the-scenes insights, readers can sign up for her newsletter or follow her on social media @baparisauthor. As her literary journey continues to unfold, fans eagerly anticipate the next twist in the tale from the talented mind of B.A. Paris.
B.A. Paris Best Quotes
“We go downstairs and in the hall, he takes my coat from the cupboard and holds it open while I slip my arms into it. In the drive outside, he holds the car door for me and waits until I’m in. As he closes it behind me, I can’t help thinking it’s a shame he’s such a sadistic bastard, because he has wonderful manners.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I don't suppose I could have a whiskey instead of the wine, could I?" "Whiskey?" "Yes" "I didn't know you drank whiskey." "And I didn't know you were a psychopath. Just bring me a whiskey”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I can’t help thinking it’s a shame he’s such a sadistic bastard, because he has wonderful manners.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I cry even harder, thinking of how it could have been, of how I thought it would be. For the first time, I want to give up, to die, because suddenly everything is too much and there is no solution in sight.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I look around at everybody laughing and joking together and struggle to understand my life has become a living hell that nobody present could even begin to imagine”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“What colour was Millie’s room, Grace?”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“When I look at him I feel dismayed as I always do at how normal he looks, because surely there should be something--pointed ears or a pair of horns--to warn people of his evilness.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“The door opens and he stands in the doorway, my handsome, psychopathic husband.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Pretending to be broken would be much harder, simply because it was in my nature to fight back.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I you Jack, but don’t Jorj Koony”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Fear,’ he whispered. ‘There is nothing quite it. I love how it looks, I love how it feels, I love how it smells. And I especially love the sound of it.’ I felt his tongue on my cheek. ‘I even love the taste of it” ― B A Paris, Behind Closed Doors
“Do I detect a renewal of your fighting spirit? I'm so glad. To tell the truth, I've been getting quite bored. Bring it on, Grace--I'm waiting for you.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“He prides himself on uttering only the truth, and enjoys that I am the only one who understands the meaning behind his words.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“But the truth is, we never really know what goes on, on the other side of the fence, behind those closed doors. Instead of looking over the fence, we should really be keeping our eyes fixed firmly on our side and cherishing the grass that we have—bald patches and all—just a little bit more.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Had it all been a facade, had he covered his true self with a cloak of geniality and good humour to impress me?”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I never really remember doing any of it, which should worry me more than it does because it means the pills are playing havoc with my already failing memory. If I were sensible, I would halve the dose. But if I were more sensible I wouldn't have needed the pills in the first place. Maybe if I ate a little more the pills wouldn't affect me as much but it seems that I've lost my appetite as well as my mind.”
― B.A. Paris, The Breakdown“Fear is the best deterrent of all.”
― B.A. Paris“Time is an oddity when it comes to memories...”
― B.A. Paris, Bring Me Back“I wait for the images to fade, listening for the sound of somebody's presence, a movement from one of the rooms, a floorboard creaking upstairs. But there is only silence, and the dust of hopes never fulfilled, taunting me with what could have been, if only I'd acted differently.”
― B.A. Paris, Bring Me Back“Do you know what Henry David Thoreau believed? ‘Happiness is a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“Red,’ says Jack. ‘It’s her favourite colour.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Happiness is a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“I can barely get the word out. ‘Red,’ I tell her, my voice breaking. ‘Millie’s room was red.’ ‘That’s what I thought,’ she says softly.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“The airport or the hospital? Your husband or your sister?’ He paused a moment. ‘Me, or Millie?”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Without routine, there is no risk of me becoming institutionalised and unable to think for myself. And I must think for myself.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“it’s a shame he’s such a sadistic bastard, because he has wonderful manners.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“The enormity of what she’s doing, of what she’s offering to do, hits me and I feel myself starting to shake. ‘Thank you,’ I whisper.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Hello, darling, it’s me.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I think time has no meaning when it comes to grief.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“What colour was Millie's room Grace?' 'Red, Millie's room was red.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“She is a woman at peace with herself. But we all have darkness within us and the deeper it’s buried, the more interesting it is.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“In And Then There None, lots of people die, and Mrs Rogers, she die from sleeping medicine.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“A smile hiding my bitter disappointment, conscious of Jack’s hand on my back.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“She looks steadily back at me. ‘What colour was Millie’s room, Grace?’ I can barely get the word out. ‘Red,’ I tell her, my voice breaking. ‘Millie’s room was red.’ ‘That’s what I thought,’ she says softly.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“We aren’t remembered for long after our deaths, only by those who carry us in their hearts.”
― B.A. Paris, The Prisoner“when I remembered how I had truly believed, on the strength of a beautiful yellow bedroom, that somewhere deep inside him lay a tiny shred of decency, I wept at my stupidity.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Stunned, I sat down on the bed, reading the message over and over again, convinced I had misunderstood it in some way. I couldn’t believe that Jack would have written something so cruel or been so cutting. He had never spoken to me in such a way before, he had never even raised his voice to me. I felt as if I’d been slapped in the face. Surely I deserved some explanation and, at the very least, an apology? I needed to talk to someone, badly, so it was sobering to realise there was no one I could call. My parents and I didn’t have the sort of relationship that would allow me to sob down the phone that he had left me by myself and for some reason I felt too ashamed to tell any of my friends. Where had the perfect gentleman I’d thought him to be gone? Had it all been a facade, had he covered his true self with a cloak of geniality and good humour to impress me?”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“When I remember how I had truly believed on the strength of a beautiful yellow bedroom, that somewhere deep inside him lay a tiny shred of decency, I wept at my stupidity.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“She's stunningly pretty but there's an air of sadness about her.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“And afterwards, as he drank in the sound of her fear and breathed in the smell of it, he wished he could keep her there for eternity.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Jack knows there is nothing more comforting than routine so he denies me any semblance of it. Although he doesn't know it, he is doing me a favour.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Time can either mend bridges or push them further apart,”
― B.A. Paris, The Dilemma“The champagne bottle knocks against the marble kitchen counter, making me jump. I glance at Jack, hoping he won’t have noticed how nervous I am. He catches me looking and smiles. ‘Perfect,’ he”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Rachel, people don’t commit murder over a parking space!’ ‘I’m sure people have been murdered for less,”
― B.A. Paris, The Breakdown“The bubbles dance in my mouth and I feel a sudden flash of happiness, which I try to hang on to. But it disappears as quickly as it came. I”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I think back to the last time I saw her. It had been about two weeks ago, the day before she’d left for New York. She’s a consultant in the UK division of a huge American consultancy firm, Finchlakers, and often goes to the US on business. That evening, we’d gone to the cinema together and then on for a drink. Maybe that was when she’d asked me to get something for Susie. I rack my brains, trying to remember, trying to guess what we might have decided to buy. It could be anything – perfume, jewellery, a book – but nothing rings a bell. Had I forgotten? Memories of Mum, uncomfortable ones, flood my mind and I push them away quickly. It isn’t the same, I tell myself fiercely, I am not the same. By tomorrow, I’ll have remembered.”
― B.A. Paris, The Breakdown“Don’t be so hysterical, it doesn’t suit you. Something’s come up, I’ll see you in the morning.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I tried to grab her but I couldn’t reach her.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Red, [...] Millie’s room was red.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“If he was able to fool me, if he was able, even for a few seconds, to make me forget what I knew about him, how would I ever be able to convince people that he was a wolf in sheep’s clothing?”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“messenger thing: it’s hard to feel grateful when he’s robbed me of my last bit of hope, that it was something other than dementia that was causing my memory loss.”
― B.A. Paris, The Breakdown“I’d begun to think that I wasn’t cut out for long-term relationships and although there was a slight sadness that I might not find someone to spend the rest of my life with, it had never become a serious preoccupation of mine.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“Happiness is a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it will”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“Millie has Down syndrome.’ Jack’s voice breaks the awkward silence that has descended on the table. ‘It means she’s often wonderfully spontaneous.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“after”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“The worst thing about these small forays into normality was the hope they gave me, because in public Jack reverted to the man I had fallen in love with. Sometimes—over the course of a meal, for example—as he played the attentive and loving husband, I forgot what he was. Maybe if he hadn’t been such good company it would have been easier to remember, but even when I did remember, it was so hard to equate the man who looked adoringly at me from the other side of the table with the man who held me prisoner that I almost believed I had imagined everything.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Tamsin starves her emotions, whereas I feed mine, something I hadn’t realised until now. When I think about it, there have been quite a few times when I’ve stood in front of the open fridge, feeding my anxiety, trying to appease it, make it go away.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“can’t help thinking it’s a shame he’s such a sadistic bastard, because he has wonderful manners.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Many women don't have anybody to turn to and are scared they won't be believed.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“It wasn't hard to fall in love with him; there was something old-fashioned about him that I found refreshing - he opened doors for me, helped me on with my coat and sent me flowers.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Under other circumstances, I would probably her. But her undoubted intelligence makes her dangerous to someone me. It's not that she doesn't appreciate perfection, as I first thought, it's more that she's suspicious of it.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Where had the perfect gentleman I'd thought him to be gone? Had it all been a facade, had he covered his true self with a cloak of geniality and good humour to impress me?”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“If it’s any consolation, there never was anything you could do about it. But I’m glad you’ve begun to accept the inevitable. It will make everything easier for you in the long run.”
― B.A. Paris“Everything I have ever told him, he has used against me.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Do you realise what you’ve done, do you realise that you’ve sold your soul to me? And Millie’s, for that matter.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I hold my hands out in front of me and the shaking that I can't control tells me what I've only just begun to realise but what Jack has known all along - that fear is the best deterrent of all.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I found it hard to believe that what was happening to me was real and it crossed my mind that maybe I was caught up in some warped television show where people were put into terrible situations while the world watched to see how they coped.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“The knowledge that the father could instil such terror into another human being turned the boy’s fear of him into admiration and he began to emulate him. Soon, the sound of his mother’s screams coming up through the floorboards became music to his ears, and the smell of her fear the richest perfume. Such was the effect it had on him that he began to crave it, so that when the father left him in charge the boy would take the mother down to the cellar, her pleas for mercy as she begged him not to leave her there only serving to excite him. And afterwards, as he drank in the sound of her fear and breathed in the smell of it, he wished he could keep her there for eternity.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I wasn't worried about pretending to be frightened, because I was. Pretending to be broken would be much harder, simply because it was in my nature to fight back.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“there’s nothing worse than knowing your child is hurting but being too far away to give her a hug.”
― B.A. Paris, The Dilemma“Wimbledon.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“If he was able to fool me, if he was able even for a few seconds, to make me forget what I knew about him, how would I ever be able to convince people that he was a wolf in sheep's clothing?”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“When I see him standing there, I feel as dismayed as I always do at how normal he looks, because surely there should be something - pointed ears or a pair of horns - to warn people of his evilness.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I can't help thinking it's a shame he's such a sadistic bastard because he has wonderful manners.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“When we only saw each other at weekends, we were on our best behavior, not wanting to spoil the time we had together. We didn’t really know each other. It’s only now that we’re discovering each other’s faults and weaknesses.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“It simple, Grace. We kill Jorj Koony.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“what”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“afterwards, as he drank in the sound of her fear and breathed in the smell of it, he wished he could keep her there for eternity.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“I hate about being kept a prisoner is not being able to make myself a cup of tea whenever I want and I miss my kettle and the regular supply of teabags and milk I used to have.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“to the news report and scan the text, searching, searching for the information that will tell me that I’m right and everyone else is wrong, that the plane didn’t crash just after takeoff but twenty minutes into its flight. Then I see it, in black and white—The plane crashed three minutes after takeoff from Cairo International Airport—and I freeze, because the only”
― B.A. Paris, The Dilemma“I’m afraid I don’t understand.’ ‘Yes, you understand.’ Millie is adamant. ‘It simple, Grace. We kill Jorj Koony.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“also because, in the six months since I had met Jack, I had never even glimpsed this side of his character.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“it’s hard being reminded of the life I used to have.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“think time has no meaning when it comes to grief.”
― B.A. Paris, The Therapist“our marriage, but if I admitted that there had”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Yes, you understand.’ Millie is adamant. ‘It simple, Grace. We kill Jorj Koony.”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“me, and the silence stretches out between”
― B.A. Paris, Behind Closed Doors“Stay with me!” I shouted above the noise of the traffic. Your hand tightened around mine. “Don’t worry, I will!” you called back. And I hoped that you would, forever.”
― B.A. Paris, Bring Me Back