Quotes from Second Nature

“The evening had turned sweet and blue.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“He'd already realized that he could not begin to understand the things men did; now he saw women were even harder to figure out. Sometimes it almost seemed as if they were thinking one thing and talking about something else completely, and you didn't know what to believe: the thing they said or the thing they didn't.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“What did we know about those closest to us, really? No one ever dared to speak plainly about desire; no one said the word out loud.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“She judged people smartly and quickly, and often found herself in a huff.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“Lydia went over and handed him a paper napkin. Conner stared at the napkin as if it were something delivered directly from the moon.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“Somehow, what they'd had was already over, and she hadn't even been aware of the end. This happened with roses: it was possible to take them for granted all summer as they wound along fences and gates, and then in September, when they faded, how beautiful they'd once been suddenly took hold. That was when people began to yearn for them, and all winter long they'd watch the bare branches for buds, vowing that this time they'd be grateful for all that they had.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“she clutched her purse and was completely composed, gracefully accepting people’s sympathies, but when they started to shovel the dirt over old dick’s coffin she began to weep, and her grief was strong enough to chase the sparrows from the trees.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“What he was doing was actually a hundred times worse. He was telling her that he loved her, something he hadn't mentioned and may not have even known when they were married. She used to whisper it to him sometimes, while he was fucking her, and he had to turn off his mind every time she did that. For some reason that declaration had seemed like a curse to him back then; he couldn't even hear it spoken aloud”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“People really could be one way outside, when inside they were torn to shreds, a fine white powder of grief and regret replacing blood and bones, and no one even noticed.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

“Men think about right and wrong, they have to debate it, discuss it, draw upon possibilities and statistics, laws and codes. Wolves have to know. They have to know in an instant, pure instinct, not thought, because they can never be wrong. If they're wrong, the ice they walk upon cracks, their lungs filled with cold water and crystals. If they're wrong, their brothers and sisters starve and their pups are shot as they run. If they're wrong, the rabid wolf comes back, and he always comes back, only this time they're sleeping, and they can't even put up a fight as he splits them apart.”
― Alice Hoffman, quote from Second Nature

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Popular quotes

“The whole work of man really seems to consist in nothing but proving to himself every minute that he is a man and not a piano key.”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, quote from Notes from Underground, White Nights, The Dream of a Ridiculous Man, and Selections from The House of the Dead

“People just want to believe. Otherwise they would have to admit that life is just a random series of good and bad things that happen until one day you die.”
― Nicola Yoon, quote from The Sun Is Also a Star

“Don’t ask me to give her up before I even really get to know her … Because you’re not going to like my response.”
― Jennifer L. Armentrout, quote from Daimon

“Once the solar parallax is known,' they told me, 'once the necessary Degrees are measur'd, and the size and weight and shape of the Earth are calculated inescapably at last, all this will vanish. We will have to seek another Space.' No one explain'd what that meant, however ...? 'Perhaps some of us will try living upon thy own Surface. I am not sure that everyone can adjust from a concave space to a convex one. Here have we been sheltered, nearly everywhere we look is no Sky, but only more Earth. -- How many of us, I wonder, could live the other way, the way you People do, so exposed to the Outer Darkness? Those terrible Lights, great and small? And wherever you may stand, given the Convexity, each of you is slight pointed away from everybody else, all the time, out into that Void that most of you seldom notice. Here in the Earth Concave, everyone is pointed at everyone else, -- ev'rybody's axes converge, -- forc'd at least thus to acknowledge one another,-- an entirely different set of rules for how to behave.”
― Thomas Pynchon, quote from Mason & Dixon

“There was, in fact, a street sign to that effect—the first I’d seen in all of Devil’s Acre. Louche Lane, it read in fancy handwritten script. Piracy discouraged.
“Discouraged?” I said. “Then what’s murder? Frowned upon?”
“I believe murder is ‘tolerated with reservations.’ ”
“Is anything illegal here?” Addison asked.
“Library late fines are stiff. Ten lashes a day, and that’s just for paperbacks.”
“There’s a library?”
“Two. Though one won’t lend because all the books are bound in human skin and quite valuable.”
― Ransom Riggs, quote from Library of Souls

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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.