Quotes from Breathing Under Water

Sophie Hardcastle ·  310 pages

Rating: (633 votes)


“Mia is the wind - the hot, dry western wind. And I am gravity.”
― Sophie Hardcastle, quote from Breathing Under Water


“I feel time beginning to slow, until the last of him is grey powder on the sea and time stops altogether.”
― Sophie Hardcastle, quote from Breathing Under Water


“I think of the horizon at midnight, the sky and sea blurring together.”
― Sophie Hardcastle, quote from Breathing Under Water


About the author

Sophie Hardcastle
Born place: in Australia
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“It’s always better for a ruler to determine who eats than it is to have a larger pie from which the people can feed themselves.”
― Bruce Bueno De Mesquita, quote from The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics


“Have you ever played chess, Kitty?”
I eyed her. What did a board game have to do with this? “Not really.”
“You and I should play sometime. I think you would like it,” she said. “It’s a game of strategy, mostly. The strong pieces are in the back row, while the weak pieces—the pawns—are all in the front, ready to take the brunt of the attack. Because of their limited movement and vulnerability, most people underestimate them and only use them to protect the more powerful pieces. But when I play, I protect my pawns.”
“Why?” I said, not entirely sure where this conversation was going. “If they’re weak, then what’s the point?”
“They may be weak when the game begins, but their potential is remarkable. Most of the time, they’ll be taken by the other side and held captive until the end of the game. But if you’re careful—if you keep your eyes open and pay attention to what your opponent is doing, if you protect your pawns and they reach the other side of the board, do you know what happens then?”
I shook my head, and she smiled.
“Your pawn becomes a queen.” She touched my cheek, her fingers cold as ice. “Because they kept moving forward and triumphed against impossible odds, they become the most powerful piece in the game. Never forget that, all right? Never forget the potential one solitary pawn has to change the entire game.”
― Aimee Carter, quote from Pawn


“Well, the natives seemed fairly friendly, so I decided to stay the night." I made a mental note never to seem fairly friendly to an explorer. If you do, he always decides to stay the night.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, quote from Works of P. G. Wodehouse


“It’s as though a cabbage tried to investigate the causes and effects of its existence,”
― Andrzej Sapkowski, quote from The Time of Contempt


“Something kept them together, frustration possibly. Like they were two parts of a troubling equation that neither could find the answer to. It was out there somewhere, in infinity, she often thought. Maybe they’d never find it.”
― Elizabeth Brundage, quote from All Things Cease to Appear


Interesting books

The Ladies' Paradise
(8.9K)
The Ladies' Paradise
by Émile Zola
Special Forces - Soldiers
(2.4K)
Special Forces - Sol...
by Aleksandr Voinov
Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits and Other Writings
(7.2K)
The Lemonade War
(12.3K)
The Lemonade War
by Jacqueline Davies
I, Zombie
(3.3K)
I, Zombie
by Hugh Howey
The Deceiver
(7.9K)
The Deceiver
by Frederick Forsyth

About BookQuoters

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.