“I had discovered that learning something, no matter how complex, wasn't hard when I had a reason to want to know it.”
― Homer Hickam, quote from Rocket Boys
“Not much comes easy in this world, Sonny. If it does, it's best to be suspicious of it. It's probably not worth much.”
― Homer Hickam, quote from Rocket Boys
“All I’ve done is give you a book,” she said. “You have to have the courage to learn what’s inside it.”
― Homer Hickam, quote from Rocket Boys
“I would tell people some years later that I was raised an only child and so was my brother.”
― Homer Hickam, quote from Rocket Boys
“You must completely dedicate yourselves to it. To do less will be to let down your country, your state, your parents, your teachers, and ultimately, yourselves. Remember this: The only good citizen is the well-educated citizen.”
― Homer Hickam, quote from Rocket Boys
“There’s a plan. If you’re willing to fight it hard enough, you can make it detour for a while, but you’re still going to end up wherever God wants you to be. G”
― Homer Hickam, quote from Rocket Boys
“We had to start somewhere, either succeed or fail, and then build what we knew as we went along.”
― Homer Hickam, quote from Rocket Boys
“I did not want to think about people. I wanted the trees, the scents and colors, the shifting shadows of the wood, which spoke language I understood. I wished I could simply disappear in it, live like a bird or a fox through the winter, and leave the things I had glimpsed to resolve themselves without me.”
― Patricia A. McKillip, quote from Winter Rose
“This was a transformation from what the late Isaiah Berlin described as “Negative Liberty” to “Positive Liberty.”4 The idea of negative liberty is perhaps more familiar. It can be defined as the absence of restraint, a freedom from interference by outside authority with individual thought or behavior. A law requiring motorcyclists to wear a helmet would be, under this definition, to prevent them from enjoying the freedom to go bareheaded if they wish. Negative liberty, therefore, can be described as freedom from. Positive liberty can best be understood as freedom to . It is not necessarily incompatible with negative liberty, but has a different focus or emphasis. Freedom of the press is generally viewed as a negative liberty—freedom from interference with what a writer writes or a reader reads. But an illiterate person suffers from a denial of positive liberty; he is unable to enjoy the freedom to write or read whatever he chooses, not because some authority prevents him from doings so but because he cannot read or write anything. He suffers not the absence of a negative liberty—freedom from—but of a positive liberty—freedom to read and write. The remedy lies not in removal of restraint but in achievement of the capacity to read and write.”
― James M. McPherson, quote from Battle Cry of Freedom
“Then, as if realizing we might be freaked out, the guy adds, ‘Hey. I’m Adam.”
― Pittacus Lore, quote from The Revenge of Seven
“She wanted to tell him to go but she couldn’t bear it if he did”
― Jojo Moyes, quote from One Plus One
“The accountant lingers at his children's doorway a moment more, listening to the easy rhythm of their breathing, and something cold moves through him, like the passage of a ghost - but he know that's not it. It's more like the portent of a future. A future that must never come to pass...
...and for the first time, he gives rise to a thought that is silently echoed in millions of homes that night.
My God... what have we done?”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from UnDivided
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.