“Four A.M. and the darkness had a quality of inexorability and menace as though it would never lift, as though, without anyone noticing it, the dawn of the day before had been the beginning of the last light ever in the history of the world.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“Mrs. Blessing was surprised at how fluently she lied, much better than she’d done it years before, when it had been so much more important, at least to her. She realized that lying was easier than telling the truth because it had such nice smooth edges, not jagged with impossibility and inconvenience the way the truth so often was.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“She had filled her days mourning that shadow life, and it had no more meaning than the chattering of monkeys. Instead, these last few weeks, she had seen what might have been had she not felt perpetually done out of something better.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“Anyone familiar with the love affairs between men and women could have told them that theirs would soon be over.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“It was a kind of circular thing: to be the kind of person who would have taken Faith in, he had to be the kind of person who would take her back.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“He’d had a dog once, in that way he’d had everything in his childhood, ordinary but a lot less lasting.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“It was a puzzle to her, how eagerly she’d rushed into life when she was eighteen or twenty, and in what a desultory fashion it had dragged out ever since.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“The curse of having young people about the house was that they were always so redolent of possibility.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“He was quiet and thoughtful, letting her do all the talking until she would reach one of her acerbic pitches and he would murmur, "You don't really mean that." But he had never seemed put off.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“He realized that there was a point to that ungainly empty area between the human shoulder and chin: it was the perfect place to rest an infant.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“He couldn't remember at first where he was, just knew by the fragile fog of the summer light that it was early, that his alarm clock would sleep longer than he had.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“The girl was huddled against the door on her side now, all folded in upon herself like an old woman, or like a child who'd fallen asleep on a long journey; she heard the sounds of him as if they were musical notes, each distinct and clear, and her shoulders moved slightly beneath her shirt, and her hands were jammed between her knees.”
― Anna Quindlen, quote from Blessings
“As they traveled the sun and moon dipped in the sky and then rose again, moving around them in a stately dance. In the summer months, at the top of the world, neither sank below the horizon. The sky was both dark and light, the sun a tiny pale ball and the moon a long thin crescent, lying on its back like a bowl. Then, for a time, the sun was directly below the moon, looking insignificant and weak.”
― Jessica Day George, quote from Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow
“On me personally what has been the most important was to understand the value of time -- and this is something that has come from observing him, learning his story and that time compounds. What you do when you are young (and as you use time over your life) can have an exponential effect so that if you are thoughtful about it, you can really have powerful results later, if you want to.
Also, that is a reason to be hopeful, because compounding is something that happens pretty quickly. If you are 50 or 60, it is not too late. He said to me one time, if there is something you really want to do, don't put it off until you are 70 years old. ... Do it now. Don't worry about how much it costs or things like that, because you are going to enjoy it now. You don't even know what your health will be like then.
On the other hand, if you are investing in your education and you are learning, you should do that as early as you possibly can, because then it will have time to compound over the longest period. And that the things you do learn and invest in should be knowledge that is cumulative, so that the knowledge builds on itself. So instead of learning something that might become obsolete tomorrow, like some particular type of software [that no one even uses two years later], choose things that will make you smarter in 10 or 20 years. That lesson is something I use all the time now.”
― Alice Schroeder, quote from The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life
“Everything comes in circles. [...] The old wheel turns, and the same spoke comes up. It's all been done before, and will be again.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Valley of Fear
“It means what you are, wanting what you want and going after it without a sens od shame. People are slaves to rules.”
― Milan Kundera, quote from The Joke
“Just let them sit in the goddam sun. But the world won't let them because there's nothing more dangerous than letting old farts sit in the sun. They might be thinking. Same thing with kids. Keep 'em busy or they might start thinking.”
― Frank McCourt, quote from Teacher Man
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.