“You're not ready to hear this yet," he concluded. "But I do need you to know that I'm going to fight for you. I'm not making the mistake of walking away from you again. The only man in you future is me, Liv. The only kids in your future are mine.”
“My mum always said if you can’t say something nice, say something memorable.”
“I miss our Would You Rather conversations and your hilarious answers. I miss your laugh. I miss the way I feel when I make you laugh. Like I just won something really important. I miss just sitting with you in perfect, silent understanding. I miss the way you never judge anyone. It’s such a rare find, Liv. And I miss watching how kind you are with everyone. I miss being able to call you and talk to you about random shit and important shit. I miss my best friend. I miss you. I love you.”
“You'll end up living a lonely life if you're waiting around for perfect.”
“No one,” I whispered, my lips trembling with the emotion, “has ever made me feel like the person I’ve always wanted to be until you. You make me feel beautiful, Nate. All the way through. No one else has ever given me that. No one.”
“I’m glad,” he murmured against my mouth. “Not just because you deserve to feel that way … but because it makes you mine.”
“How can such a coward teach someone to be brave?”
“I’m going to let you keep that smug look on your face. You earned it.”
“I never meant to fall in love with you. But I did. I felt it the first night I made love to you. I tried to walk away then because I've never felt so lost and yet so fucking found as I felt that night looking into your eyes as I moved inside you.”
“I didn't just want Nate to love me. I wanted him to love me the way I loved him. The kind of love that's so big it would last beyond a lifetime.”
“What would you prefer? Life in a maximum-security prison or trapped in Jurassic Park?"
"Do I have a social standing in this prison?"
"No. You're just an average Joe."
"Then I guess I have to go with Jurassic Park."
"Why?"
"Well, I'll have constant fresh air, for a start, and also if I'm going to be anyone's prey, I'm going to be the prey of an animal that's acting out of instinct rather than psychopathy... You?"
"If you're in Jurassic Park, I'm in Jurassic Park.”
“You okay?’ Nate asked warily.
My fingers shook with the hangover as I leaned across my sink. ‘I look like the Bride of Frankenstein with a massive hangover.’
‘I’d be hungover too if I’d just had to fuck Frankenstein.”
“Do you play video games, Liv?’ he asked congenially.
‘Uh, yes.’
‘Well, stop cleaning up the dishes and come play with us,’ he teased.
I chuckled. ‘Are you asking me on a playdate?’ As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I regretted them. I wasn’t being flirty. I didn’t know how to be flirty! That was just my sense of humor, and now this guy was going to think I was coming on –
Nate laughed, cutting me off. ‘Only because you got the Star Trek reference. Otherwise, girls aren’t allowed to play with us. They’re icky.’
Deadpan, I crossed my arms over my chest. ‘Well, boys are icky too.’
He grinned huge. ‘Ain’t that the truth.”
“Let’s start with how you don’t feel sexually attractive.”
I gulped. “All right.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Upstairs in my bed, where it had all started, I slowly made love to Nate, promising him with every inch of me, that the ‘after’ we’d found together … well … it was forever.”
“You taught me to be brave again, Nate.'
I swiped at the tears, my heart catching painfully as his eyes seared into mine.
'How can such a coward teach someone to be brave?”
“I want to be someone's big love, Dad. I think I deserve to have the man I love love me back just as much.”
“"Mom, Arnie Welsh keeps calling me a geek. He says it like it's a bad thing. Is being a geek a bad thing?"
"Of course not, Soda Pop. And don't listen to labels. They don't matter."
"What are labels?"
"It's an imaginery sticker people slap on you with the word they think you are written on it. It doesn't matter who they think you are. It matters who you think you are."
"I think I might be a geek."
She laughed. "Then you be a geek. Just be whatever makes you happy, Soda Pop, and I'll be happy too.”
“Liv's perfect. She deserves perfect. She won't be settling for anything else.”
“It occurred to me that more than loss, it was the longing that hurt the most.”
“If you were just some woman in a bar, I’d pick you out from all the others, take you home, and fuck you so hard you wouldn’t be able to walk straight in the morning.”
I gulped.
In fact, I think I might have had a little mini-orgasm.”
“Okay, we’ll take it step by step. Strip to your underwear.”
A shiver went through me at his demand, but I found myself replying, “You could ask nicely, you know.”
His lips twitched. “Olivia, sweetheart, would you please strip down to your underwear for me?”
“Anger engulfed me and I ripped my hand away from him. ‘You left me,’ I growled. ‘You treated me no better than one of your random hookups, and suddenly because you’ve decided that no, wait, you do love me, I'm to come running back?’ I stood up, my chair clattering behind me with the force of the movement. ‘Your words are nice in the moment. But at the end of the day it means fuck all. I don’t trust you with your own feelings, Nate. Why the hell would I trust you with mine?”
“You’re not ready to hear this yet,” he concluded. “But I do need you to know that I’m going to fight for you. I’m not making the mistake of walking away from you again. The only man in your future is me, Liv. The only kids in your future are mine.”
“That would make it the fifth time since I'd started working at the university that I'd thrown someone out of one of those rooms for inappropriate behavior. And they say a library is a boring place to work.”
“I believed in all the things written within me, I’d just somehow along the way stopped believing in my book jacket.”
“Nate, your commitment phobia is showing again." He turned to me in mock horror.
"Where?" He patted his cheeks anxiously. "Get it off me.”
“Life changes us second by second.”
“I tutted. “That’s cold, Nate.”
“Hey—” He pointed his finger at me.
“I’m not a complete shit. I realized later that night that it was a stupid bloody idea and I felt awful.”
“Felt awful?” Nathan harrumphed.
“You cried your eyes out.” I pinched my lips together to keep from laughing. Nate scowled.
“Manly tears. Manly tears of regret.”
Young, Samantha (2014-01-07). Before Jamaica Lane (On Dublin Street Book 3) (Kindle Locations 2913-2916). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.”
“Jessilyn, ain't no man can't get someplace he never thought he'd get to. You let enough bad thoughts into your head, you can end up doin' all sorts of things you never thought possible. Otis let evil into his mind and it took over his heart. We best be on our guard and keep our minds on what's right and true so we don't become things we'll regret. His words scared me. I wanted to always be able to trust people, to know that good people stayed good people, but I was realizing all too quickly that the human heart is fragile and needs constant attention. I'd seen enough bleakness in my own heart to know my daddy was speaking the truth. That's why we all need to know Jesus in our hearts, Daddy said. Ain't no one else who can keep watch over our hearts like He can. Ain't no one else who can take the bad and replace it with good.”
“My father, Li Tong, used to say, ‘Church leader who does not believe in God is like barefoot shoe salesman.’ We call our bureau leader the Caiaphas of China.” “What does that mean?” “You remember Caiaphas from the Bible?” “No.” “Did someone take your Bible from you?” “No. It’s on my shelf. Remember? I’ve got three of them.” “Perhaps Ben Fielding should give two away and then start reading the other one.”
“Noah." Grace sounded as though she was strangling. "Why don't you just paint a big red A on my forehead, for heaven's sake?"
He grinned. Grace was more prickly than usual, and Noah hoped part of that mood was caused by sexual frustration. She wanted him, but he'd deliberately kept her from knowing what he'd ask of her. He'd hoped to heighten her anticipation, and help her forget some of her nervousness.
"Gracie, you're the one who announced to all and sundry that you'd taken advantage of me. What difference does it make if Graham knows your intent?"
She mumbled again and punched the elevator button.
Making no attempt to hide his good humor, Noah asked, "What was that, Grace?"
The elevator doors slid open and he allowed Grace to yank him inside. As the doors shut behind them, she glared, and her brown eyes smoldered. Indicating her clothes, she said, "I'd at least like to look presentable while ruining my reputation.”
“Wer vermag fröhlicher zu sein als ein Kranker? nichts zwingt ihn, sich dem Lebenskampf zu stellen, es steht ihm sogar frei zu sterben. Er ist nicht gezwungen, aus den Ereignissen, die der Tag ihm zuträgt, induktive Schlüsse zu ziehen, um danach sein Verhalten einzurichten, er darf in sein eigenes Denken eingesponnen bleiben, - eingesponnen in die Autonomie seines Wissens, darf er deduktiv, darf er theologisch denken. Wer vermag fröhlicher zu sein als der, der seinen Glauben denken darf!”
“It is customary to blame secular science and anti-religious philosophy for the eclipse of religion in modern society. It would be more honest to blame religion for its own defeats. Religion declined not because it was refuted, but because it became irrelevant, dull, oppressive, insipid. When faith is completely replaced by creed, worship by discipline, love by habit; when the crisis of today is ignored because of the splendor of the past; when faith becomes an heirloom rather than a living fountain; when religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion--its message becomes meaningless.”
BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.