Quotes from Harvesting the Heart

Jodi Picoult ·  453 pages

Rating: (39.4K votes)


“I knew that somewhere God was laughing. He had taken the other half of my heart, the one person who knew me better than I knew myself, and He had done what nothing else could do. By bringing us together, He had set into motion the one thing that could tear us apart.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“Suddenly I realize that this is what I've been waiting for - a man who depends entirely on me... I dreamed for years of a man who couldn't live without me, a man who pictured my face when he closed his eyes, who loved me when I was a mess in the morning and when dinner was late and even when I overloaded the washing machine and burned out the motor. [My son] stares up at me as if I can do no wrong. I have always wanted someone who treats me the way he does; I just didn't know that I'd have to give birth to him.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“Perhaps he d always known that the truth of a person lies in the heart.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“With these words Jake had let go of me. Which proved that he knew more about why I was leaving than even I did. I had believed that I was running away from what had happened. I did not know, not until I met Nicholas days later, that the whole time I was really running towards what was yet to be.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“I imagined what it would be like to hold a butterfly in your hands something bejeweled and treasured and to know that despite your devotion it was dying by degrees.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart



“[...] Wondering why white people named girl babies things like Hope and Faith and Patience - names they could never live up to - and black mothers called their daughters Mercy, Deliverance, Salvation - crosses they'd always have to bear.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“After sticking out life, I hope it's whatever you want it to be.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“Marriage didnt really seem to be about love; it was about the ability to live together for a long period of time”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“could not be blamed just because no one ever mentioned that once you closed the storybook, Cinderella still had to do laundry and clean the toilet and take care of the crown prince.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“It worked out the way it should have,”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart



“I wondered what the hell had convinced me to live at the end of someone else’s life rather than live my own,”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“I was starting to see that the past might color the future, but it didn’t determine it. And if I could believe that, it was much easier to let go of what I’d done wrong.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“Perhaps he’d always known that the truth of a person lies in the heart.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“He wandered off, leaving me to wonder why white people named girl babies things like Hope and Faith and Patience—names they could never live up to—and black mothers called their daughters Mercy, Deliverance, Salvation—crosses they’d always have to bear.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“i had not meant to leave them; i had only meant to leave. i wasnt running away from them; i was only running away”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart



“whatever does happen the way it’s supposed to? You don’t plan life, you just do it.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“on top of a print of a turbaned man with a face as old as honesty.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“What if, when I get home, Nicholas is standing on the porch with open arms, willing to pick up where we left off? Can I let myself make the same mistakes all over again?”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“She had given me my first crayons and coloring book, and had held me when I messed up, assuring me that the lines were for people with no imagination”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“I started to wonder what it might have felt like to live your life in a place someone else had carved.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart



“He wondered why, after years of wanting to stand at the very top, he felt so goddamned empty.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“But he wondered how very different two worlds had to be before they kept people apart.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“there is such a difference between living the life you are expected to live and living the life you want to live.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“Her silhouette is obscenely green against the frost, as if she has left in her wake an artificial spring.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“When you don't keep looking back its that much easier not to trip and fall.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart



“What will Dad say?” he whispered. His mother could not possibly have heard him at such a distance, but she seemed to understand his question. “I imagine,” she said, stepping into a neat square of the brilliant afternoon, “he’ll say, ‘Hello, Max.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“I can stand on my own in a world that is falling apart. I can stand so well, I realize, that I can support someone else.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“I had believed that I was running away from what had happened. I did not know—not until I met Nicholas days later—that the whole time I was really running toward what was yet to be.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


“he was starting in the middle.”
― Jodi Picoult, quote from Harvesting the Heart


About the author

Jodi Picoult
Born place: in Nesconset, Long Island, New York,, The United States
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“Everybody knows girls like the bad boys, and I’m thoroughly bad.”
― Jasinda Wilder, quote from Falling Under


“Flirtatious men I could handle. It was the serious ones, like Neil, who made me nervous—the ones who looked straight at you and spoke simply and had no use for games. Men like Neil, I thought, might talk of love and mean it, while flirtatious men demanded nothing, promised less, and never disappointed.”
― Susanna Kearsley, quote from The Splendour Falls


“Fear of living, fear of falling, fear of losing your job, your car, your home, your possessions, fear of never having what you ought to have in order to be. In the widespread clamor for public security, imperiled by lurking criminal monsters, the members of the middle class shout loudest. They defend order as if they owned it, even though they’re only tenants overwhelmed by high rents and the threat of eviction.”
― Eduardo Galeano, quote from Upside Down: A Primer for the Looking-Glass World


“Every being in this world makes an impact on at least one person they encounter during their lifetime. You can change the course of someone’s life by just a kind word, a hateful one, or even by simply choosing not to say anything at all. Every choice you make has the potential to create a ripple effect, trickling into and affecting the lives of others.
Life, your existence in this world, is a very powerful thing. Truly a gift that you can give to others, but by hiding behind my fears, by isolating everyone around me, I know that my gift has been utterly wasted. There is no mark I’ve made in this world. No betterment has been achieved. I’ve allowed myself to experience nothing that I could utilize in teaching others, helping others, or bettering their lives.
And as I come to this realization, the flame within me begins to burn so intensely, it illuminates the darkness, lighting the path I must take to become the person I know I want to be. That I can become. But I also know that it won’t be an easy journey.
There will be heartache.
There will be anger.
There will be fear.
There will be sorrow.
But as with all life, there must be balance.
Without heartache, there is no understanding of the true meaning of love. Without anger, passion cannot be comprehended. Without fear, there is nothing gained when overcome. And without sorrow, happiness can never be realized.”
― L.B. Simmons, quote from The Resurrection of Aubrey Miller


“Sieh sie dir an", sagte Vincent. "Alle finden einfach zueinander. Sie kommen so mühelos zusammen. Warum passiert mir das nicht?”
― quote from Torture the Artist


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