“If you didn't love him, this never would have happened. But you did. And accepting that love and everything that followed it is part of letting it go.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I was worn out, broken: He had taken almost everything. But he'd been all I'd had, all this time. And when the police led him away, I pulled out of the hands of all these loved one, sobbing, screaming, everything hurting, to try and make him stay.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I wondered if he ever thought of me, and hated the pang I felt when I told myself he didn't.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“After everything that happened, how could I miss him? But I did, I did.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“It's so easy to get caught up in what people expect of you. Sometimes, you can just lose yourself.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“Behind the camera, I was invisible. When I lifted it up to my eye it was like I crawled into the lens, losing myself there. and everything else fell away.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I'd heard of Evergreen Care Center before. Cass and I had always made fun of the stupid ads they ran on TV, featuring some dragged-out woman with a limp perm and big, painted-on circles under her eyes, downing vodka and sobbing uncontrollably. "We can't heal you at Evergreen", the very somber voiceover said. "But we can help you to heal yourself." It had become our own running joke, applicable to almost anything.
"Hey Cass, "I'd say, "hand me that toothpaste."
"Caitlin," she'd say, her voice dark and serious. "I can't hand you the toothpaste. But I CAN help you hand the toothpaste to yourself.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“And she was good to me: strong, fun, and fiercely loyal. And if I didn't have many other friends because of her-most girls were intimidated by her looks, or thought she was too pushy, or just flat-out feared for their boyfriends-it never bothered me. I never missed having a wide, thick circle of girlfriends: Rina was more than enough. We were comfortable with each other's flaws and weaknesses, so we stuck together and kept to ourselves.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“Rogerson," I asked him sweetly as we sat watching a video in the pool house, "where would I find the pelagic zone?"
"In the open sea," he said. "Now shut up and eat your Junior Mints.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“It's funny how someone's perception of you can be formed without you even knowing it.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I couldn't tell her. I couldn't tell anyone. As long as I didn't say it aloud, it wasn't real.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I had this wild thought that he was the only one in all this chaos who was just like me, and that was comforting and profound all at once.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“Your mother won a special reward," she told me, "because everyone had a head in her pictures. We all applauded.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“If there's one thing I've learned in the last few months, it's that sometimes you just have to close your eyes and jump.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“Wake up, Caitlin, Mr. Lensing had said. But what he didn't understand was that this dreamland was preferable, walking through this life half-sleeping, everything at arm's length or farther away.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“What was the name of Pygmalion's sister?"
She blinked, twice, obviously surprised. "Ummm," she said, keeping her eyes on me. "I don't know."
Rogerson did," I told her. "Rogerson knew everything.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“She was just a shell of her former self, functioning and talking but hardly alive.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I took his wildness from him and tried to fold it into myself, filling up the empty spaces all those second place finishes left behind.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“It’s so easy to get caught up in what people expect of you. Sometimes, you can just lose yourself”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“But what he didn't understand was that this dreamland was preferable,walking through this life half-sleeping,everything at arm's length or farther away.
I understood those mermaids.I didn't care if they sang to me.All I wanted was to block out all the human voices as they called me name again and again,pulling me upward into light,to drown.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“Well, it's New Year's now but I don't feel that way anymore. I wonder if you do either. Something's happening to me. It's like I'm shrinking smaller and smaller and I can't stp it. There's just os much wrong that I can't imagine the shame in admitting even the tiniest part of it. When you left it was like there was this huge gap to fill, but instead of spreading wide enough to do it I just fell right in, and I'm still falling. Like I'm half-asleep, and I can't wake up, can't wake up....”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“During this time we've been apart, it's you I've thought of when I'm at my weakest, and you who have pulled me through.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I was running from one problem or place to another, with no time left to study, or sleep, or just breathe. I felt pulled in all directions, fighting to keep all these obligations circling in the air above me. It was only a matter of time before something fell.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“Can she be divorced?" I asked. "And famous for her commercials
and ideas?"
She can be anything," Boo told me, and this is what I remember most, her freckled
face so solemn, as if
she knew she was the first to tell me. "And so can you.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“There were moments - when Jeopardy came on, in the car during radio trivia challenges, or for practically any question I couldn't answer in any subject - that Rogerson simply amazed me. I started to seek out facts, just to stump him, but it never worked. He was that sharp.
"In physics," I sprung on him as we sat in the Taco Bell drive-through, "what does the capital letter W stand for?"
"Energy," he said, handing me my burrito.
Sitting in front of my parents' house as he kissed me goodnight: "Which two planets are almost identical in size?"
"Duh," he said, smoothing my hair back, "Venus and Earth."
"Rogerson," I asked him sweetly as we sat watching a video in the pool house, "where would I find the pelagic zone?"
"In the open sea," he said. "Now shut up and eat your Junior Mints.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“All we had was her room, her stories, and the quiet that settled in as we tried in vain to spread ourselves out and fill the space she'd left behind.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“And that was as far as he got before i heard it. The thumping of footsteps, running up the lawn toward me: It seemed like I could hear it through the grass, like leaning your ear to a railroad track and feeling the train coming, miles away. As the noise got closer I could hear ragged breaths, and then a voice.
It was my mother.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“I jammed my hand in my jacket pocket, bracing myself fo the next hit, and fel something. Something grainy and samll, sticking to the tips of my fingers: the sand from Commons Park.
Oh Cass, I thought. I miss you so, so much.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
“We laughed ourselves silly, taking back our shared past, gently, piece by piece.”
― Sarah Dessen, quote from Dreamland
Sarah Dessen
Born place: in Illinois, The United States
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“Stand up there tomorrow morning and be proud of your humiliation.”
― Jen Calonita, quote from Broadway Lights
“This power came forth out of the Atlantic Ocean, for in those days the Atlantic was navigable; and there was an island situated in front of the straits which are by you called the Pillars of Heracles; the island was larger than Libya and Asia put together, and was the way to other islands, and from these you might pass to the whole of the opposite continent which surrounded the true ocean; for this sea which is within the Straits of Heracles is only a harbour, having a narrow entrance, but that other is a real sea, and the surrounding land may be most truly called a boundless continent. Now in this island of Atlantis there was a great and wonderful empire which had rule over the whole island and several others, and over parts of the continent, and, furthermore, the men of Atlantis had subjected the parts of Libya within the columns of Heracles as far as Egypt, and of Europe as far as Tyrrhenia. This vast power, gathered into one, endeavoured to subdue at a blow our country and yours and the whole of the region within the straits; and then, Solon, your country shone forth, in the excellence of her virtue and strength, among all mankind. She was pre-eminent in courage and military skill, and was the leader of the Hellenes. And when the rest fell off from her, being compelled to stand alone, after having undergone the very extremity of danger, she defeated and triumphed over the invaders, and preserved from slavery those who were not yet subjugated, and generously liberated all the rest of us who dwell within the pillars. But afterwards there occurred violent earthquakes and floods; and in a single day and night of misfortune all your warlike men in a body sank into the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like manner disappeared in the depths of the sea. For which reason the sea in those parts is impassable and impenetrable, because there is a shoal of mud in the way; and this was caused by the subsidence of the island. ”
― Plato, quote from Timaeus/Critias
“Life is a series of hellos and goodbyes. This... is goodbye. But not out last hello.”
― Charles Martin, quote from Where the River Ends
“Fall colors are funny. They’re so bright and intense and beautiful. It’s like nature is trying to fill you up with color, to saturate you so you can stockpile it before winter turns everything muted and dreary.”
― Siobhan Vivian, quote from Same Difference
“But there are forces that don't let you turn back and undo things, because to do so would be to deny what is already in motion, to unwrite and erase passages, to shorten the arc of a story you don't own. If I could walk into the house and say, "Froggy, I'm sorry I left." If I could hug him and unbutton his shirt and pick the petals from his hair. If I could do that, there would be no reason for me to fight this war.”
― Salvador Plascencia, quote from The People of Paper
Spilling Open: The A...
Cat and Mouse
It Can't Happen Here
Crocodile Tears
Lost in the FunhouseBookQuoters 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.
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