Quotes from Everfound

“Wars are often waged not because of what we believe, but because of the things we want others to believe.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Love turns a heart to crystal...Much more valuable, but much more fragile.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“I remember the first time I saw you,” Allie said.
“I thought you smelled me first.”
“Right,” said Allie. “The chocolate. But then I saw you as I sat up in the dead forest, thinking I knew you. At the time, I thought I must have seen you through the windshield when our cars crashed…. But that wasn’t it. I think, way back then, I was seeing you as you are now. Isn’t that funny?”
“Not as funny as the way I always complained, and the way you always bossed me around!”
They embraced and held each other for a long time.
“Don’t forget me,” Nick said. “No matter where your life goes, no matter how old you get. And if you ever get the feeling that someone is looking over your shoulder, but there’s nobody there, maybe it’ll be me.”
“I’ll write to you,” said Allie, and Nick laughed. “No really. I’ll write the letter then burn it, and if I care just enough it will cross into Everlost.”
“And,” added Nick, “it will show up as a dead letter at that the post office Milos made cross into San Antonio!”
Allie could have stood there saying good-bye forever, because it was more than Nick she was saying good-bye to. She was leaving behind four years of half-life in a world that was both stunningly beautiful, and hauntingly dark. And she was saying good-bye to Mikey. I’ll be waiting for you, he had said…. Well, if he was, maybe she wasn’t saying good-bye at all.
Nick hefted the backpack on his shoulder. “Shouldn’t you be heading off to Memphis?” he said. “You’d better hit the road…. Jack.” Then he chuckled by his own joke, and walked off.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Love, Allie concluded, wasn't blind, it simply saw alternate dimensions.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“We can lie to ourselves, saying we believe one thing, and sometimes we convince other's it's true, with the hope that by convincing others, we can convince ourselves. Wars are often waged not because of what we believe, but because of the things we want others to believe.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Mooooon!” said the Ogre. “Tranquility …” Then he pointed at the full moon. “Neil Armstrong walked in a sea of Tranquility.” Then he added, “It’s made of cheese. But you have to take off the plastic before you put it on a burger.”
Mickey sighed.
“What’s his story?” the wraith asked.
“He’s chocolate,” Mikey said.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“So the gods must mean something else,” said Jix.
“God, not gods!” insisted Johnnie.
Nick threw up his hands. “God, gods, or whatever,” said Nick. “Right now, it doesn’t matter whether it’s Jesus, or Kukulcan, or a dancing bear at the end of the tunnel. What matters is that we have a clue, and we have to figure it out.”
“Why?” Johnnie asked again. “Why does God – excuse me, I mean ‘the Light of Universal Whatever’- why does it just give us a freakin’ impossible clue? Why can’t it just tell us what we’re supposed to do?”
“Because,” said Mikey. “the Dancing Bear wants us to suffer.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“In short, there are mysteries of science and of soul that will never be understood no matter how hard we measure, no matter how strongly we believe, no matter how deep our think tanks and how high our aspirations. But as anyone will tell you—for we all know this within our hearts—the impossible happens and grand cosmic mysteries are solved on a regular basis, although most of the time the solutions lead to even greater mysteries.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“For weeks Charlie had been singing the same song over and over again.
“Dinah won’t you blow…”
He sang it twenty-four hours a day, with the same vacant, cheerful tone.
”Dinah won’t you blow your hor-or-orn?”
He kept the beat with his head, endlessly banging it against the hallways bulkhead.
“Dinah won’t you blow…”
Johnnie-O, who had very little patience to begin with, would have pulled out his hair, were it possible for an Afterlight’s hair to come out.
“Dinah won’t you blow…”
Johnnie squeezed his oversized hands into fists, wishing there was something he could bust, but having spent many years trying to break things, he knew more than anyone that Everlost stuff didn’t break, unless breakage was its purpose.
“Dinah won’t you blow your horn!”
“Dammit, will you shut your hole or I swear I’m gonna pound you into next Tuesday and then throw you out of the stinkin’ window where you and your song can drown and sink down to the center of earth for all I care, so you better shut your hole right now!”
Charlie looked at him for a moment, eyes wide, considering it. Then he said, ”Someone’s in the kitchen with Dinah!”
Johnnie groaned.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“If someone had told Allie that she would commit a premeditated act of murder, she would not have believed it. She would have spouted off all the reasons how she could never be capable of such a thing—that no matter how dire the circumstances, she would find a better way. She was so naive, so arrogant to think that the laws of necessity and unthinkable circumstance could not apply to her. She could tell herself that this was an act of mercy, but that would be a lie. This was an act of war. An act of terrorism. It was nothing less than an assassination.
If I do this, Allie told herself, I am no better than Mary. I will have sunk to the worst possible place a person can go. After this moment, I will be a cold-blooded killer and it can never be taken back.
So the question was, did Allie Johnson have the strength to sacrifice all that was left of her innocence if it meant she might save the world?”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“When I touched that boy, I felt something. Something awful. Something I can’t describe.”
“We all felt it,” Nick said.
“You may have felt it, but I caused it.” Then both his eyes seemed to go far away. “Something changed out there. I don’t know what it was, but something in the world changed because that kid didn’t deserve what I did to him—and the powers that be know that I did it.” Nick watched as a tear fell from his Everlost eye and disappeared through the living world table.
“What if,” said Nick, not even sure what he was going to say yet, “what if you were that kid and you were told you could change the world, but you would have to sacrifice yourself to do it?”
Clarence chuckled at the thought. “I believe that question was already asked a long time ago, and that creepy kid did not look anything like Jesus to me.”
“But you do think that something changed. . . .”
“I don’t know whether it’s good or bad.”
“What if it’s neither?” suggested Nick. “What if we get to make it one or the other?”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Your friend Mikey knew what my touch could do, but he didn’t tell me. He turned me into a murderer. Worse than a murderer.”
“I think,” said Nick, “they call that manslaughter or wrongful death, don’t they? I mean, when it’s an accident or out of ignorance, or something.”
Clarence turned to Nick, studying him with his Everlost eye. “You’re a lot smarter than you were back in the cage,” Clarence said. “You look better too. Back then you were a thing, now you’re almost a person.”
“Thanks . . . but ‘almost’ is still ‘almost.’”
“Yeah, well, we’re all almost something.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Allie took Nick and Mikey into the vault, and they sat there, a summit meeting of three questionable superpowers: a skinjacker, an ex-ogre, and a part-time monster.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Then Jix locked eyes with him and said very calmly, "If you hit her, I will open my mouth wide enough to swallow you whole, force you through my bowels, then out my other end."
Avalon scowled at him. "You can't do that."
"Try me," Jix said. Avalon backed off, then angrily stormed away, and Jix winked at Jill. "One in five.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“From the end of the bar, the bartender threw a sidelong look at him, so Clarence pulled out a broken Bluetooth headset and fixed it to his ear.
"I learned this trick while traveling with Mikey," Clarence told Nick. "Makes my brand of crazy the same as everyone else's.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Picking locks was not a skill he had ever cultivated, but he persisted day after day, turning the tip of his talon into different ways of approaching a keyhole. He never tired, and he ever gave up...because if there was any justice in the universe, he wouldn't be trapped here forever.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Mary believes she was put on earth to bring an end to the living world.”
Both Nick and Mikey just stared at her.
“What do you mean … end?” asked Mikey.
“End means end. Complete and total destruction. She wants to kill everyone and everything. She wants to bring down every building, burn every forest, empty every ocean of life. She wants to turn the earth into a dead planet …”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“He felt a fluttering inside his chest that he mistook for an air pocket - probably left from when he pushed himself through the cage. He had no way of knowing that the fluttering was a single beat from the fleeting memory of a heart.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“His existence had always been comfortable, he had always held a clear picture of himself, his duties, and his place in a world. He saw that world as a place so full of turning gears he had no hope of comprehending how things fit together, so why even try?
Now things were different, however. Now he wasn’t just looking out from inside of the clockwork. Instead, he was actually seeing the final motion of the escapement—the ticking hands of the clock itself.
And it was a doomsday clock.
Both his feline and human instincts told him to let it be. It was not his problem, or his place to interfere. If the living world was destined to fall, let it happen, let it pass into history once and for all. Who was he to try to save it?
But on the other hand, if the living world were lost, then there would never again be great cats to furjack . . . and couldn’t it be that hearing the actual ticking of the clock gave one the responsibility to stop it?”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“And so when the scar wraith approached him, he took a diagonal step backward putting himself behind Squirrel like a king retreating behind a pawn.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“Love turns a heart to crystal,” said Mikey. “Much more valuable, but much more fragile.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

“If the yacht's sails were wind-tattered, if its polished brass and varnished wood were scarred from a hundred successful voyages, it would have suited him, because character should always come before beauty.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everfound

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