Quote collection
525 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"My heart shoots into my throat every time I think I see his loping walk, or catch sight of some floppy brown hair on a boy - but it's never him, and each time it isn't, my heart does a reverse trajectory down into the very pit of my stomach."
"We wanted the freedom to love. We wanted the freedom to choose. Now we have to fight for it."
"So are you going to be my knight in shining armor or what?' Kent does a little bow. 'You know I can't resist a damsel in distress."
"We’ll go.” Her voice is surprisingly deep and forceful. Set in her sunken, shipwreck face, her eyes burn like two smoldering coals. “We’ll fight."
"I thought the Invalids were beasts; I thought they would rip me apart. But these people saved me, and gave me the softest place to sleep, and nursed me back to health, and haven't asked for anything in return. The animals are on the other side of the fence: monsters wearing uniforms. They speak softly, and tell lies, and smile as they're slitting your throat."
"Fourth period I have "life skills", which is what they call gym when you're old enough to be offended by forced physical activity (Elody thinks they should call it slavery instead, for accuracy)."
"Maybe he sees it on my face, that fraction of a second when I let my guard down, because in that moment his expression softens and his eyes go bright as flame and even though I barely see him move, suddenly he has closed the space between us and he’s wrapping his warm hands over my shoulders—fingers so warm and strong I almost cry out—and saying, “Lena. I like you, okay? That’s it. That’s all. I like you.” His voice is so low and hypnotic it reminds me of a song. I think of predators dropping silently from trees: I think of enormous cats with glowing amber eyes, just like his."
"Maybe all of these different possibilities exist at the same time, like each moment we live has a thousand other moments layered underneath it that look different."
"It's amazing how close I have been, all this time, to my old life. And yet the distance that divides me from it is vast."
"It's Connecticut: being like the people around you is the whole point."
"Things would get difficult again. But that was okay too. The bravery was in moving forward, no matter what."
"That's the thing about best friends. That's what they do. They keep you from spinning off the edge."
"Who knows? Maybe they’re right. Maybe we are driven crazy by our feelings. Maybe love is a disease, and we would be better off without it. But we have chosen a different road. And in the end that is the point of escaping the cure: We are free to choose. We are even free to choose the wrong thing."
"We are always being pushed and squeezed down one road or another. We have no choice but to step forward, and then step forward again, and then step forward again; suddenly we find ourselves on a road we haven't chosen at all."
"In a world without love, this is what people are to each other: values, benefits, and liabilities, numbers and data. We weigh, we quantify, we measure, and the soul is ground to dust."
"We stand there for a moment, looking at each other, and in that instant I feel our connection so strongly it's as though it achieves physical existence, becomes a hand all around us, cupping us together, protecting us. This is what people are always talking about when they talk about god: this feeling, of being held and understood and protected. feeling this way seems about as close to saying a prayer as you could get."
"I don't know whether these feelings - this thing growing inside of me - is something horrible and sick or the best thing that's ever happened to me. Either way, I can't stop it. I've lost control. And the truly sick thing is that despite everything, I'm glad."
"I was glad when the Invalids were executed. Some people complained that lethal injection was too humane for convicted terrorists, but I thought it sent a powerful message: We are not the evil ones. We are reasonable and compassionate. We stand for fairness, structure, and organization. It’s the other side, the uncureds, who bring the chaos."
"You don't reach points in life at which everything is sorted out for us. I believe in endings that should suggest our stories always continue."
"The devil stole into the Garden of Eden. He carried with him the disease - amor deliria nervosa - in the form of a seed. It grew and flowered into a magnificent apple tree, which bore apples as bright as blood. -From Genesis: A Complete History of the World and the Known Universe, by Steven Horace, PhD, Harvard University"