Quotes from Strangers

Barbara Elsborg ·  309 pages

Rating: (9.4K votes)


“Kate, I need to use the toilet,” he called through the door.

“You’ve just had hours in the sea. Couldn’t you have gone then?”

“Mum told me to get out of the water first.”

“What, even the ocean?”

“It’s wrong to pollute.” He tried to sound serious. ”
― Barbara Elsborg, quote from Strangers


“Better not to have anything. Not even love. If you got attached to something, it only got taken away. Child or adult. Toys or people. No difference”
― Barbara Elsborg, quote from Strangers


“...do me the very great honor of becoming...the person who'll cook me lovely things to eat, who'll cheer me up when I'm miserable, who'll tell me no and mean it...”
― Barbara Elsborg, quote from Strangers


“I want you so much I’m scared,” he whispered.

“I’m scared I want you so much,” Kate whispered back.”
― Barbara Elsborg, quote from Strangers


“I love you because I can be honest with you. I trust you. I love you because you've made me see I'm more than I thought.”
― Barbara Elsborg, quote from Strangers



“I don’t feel part of the world. No one needs me or wants me or even likes me very much. I don’t like myself. The world will keep turning without me. I’ll be no great loss. I’m just a temporary misuse of a minute amount of carbon.”
― Barbara Elsborg, quote from Strangers


About the author

Barbara Elsborg
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Popular quotes

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― Jodi Picoult, quote from My Sister's Keeper


“He knew you can't really be strong until you can see a funny side of things.”
― Ken Kesey, quote from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest


“I couldn’t see the point of getting up. I had nothing to look forward to.”
― Sylvia Plath, quote from The Bell Jar


“Because I wanted you." He turned from the window to face me. "More than I ever wanted anything in my life," he added softly.

I continued staring at him, dumbstruck. Whatever I had been expecting, it wasn't this. Seeing my openmouthed expression, he continued lightly. "When I asked my da how ye knew which was the right woman, he told me when the time came, I'd have no doubt. And I didn't. When I woke in the dark under that tree on the road to Leoch, with you sitting on my chest, cursing me for bleeding to death, I said to myself, 'Jamie Fraser, for all ye canna see what she looks like, and for all she weighs as much as a good draft horse, this is the woman'"

I started toward him, and he backed away, talking rapidly. "I said to myself, 'She's mended ye twice in as many hours, me lad; life amongst the MacKenzies being what it is, it might be as well to wed a woman as can stanch a wound and set broken bones.' And I said to myself, 'Jamie, lad, if her touch feels so bonny on your collarbone, imagine what it might feel like lower down...'"

He dodged around a chair. "Of course, I thought it might ha' just been the effects of spending four months in a monastery, without benefit of female companionship, but then that ride through the dark together"--he paused to sigh theatrically, neatly evading my grab at his sleeve--"with that lovely broad arse wedged between my thighs"--he ducked a blow aimed at his left ear and sidestepped, getting a low table between us--"and that rock-solid head thumping me in the chest"--a small metal ornament bounced off his own head and went clanging to the floor--"I said to myself..."

He was laughing so hard at this point that he had to gasp for breath between phrases. "Jamie...I said...for all she's a Sassenach bitch...with a tongue like an adder's ...with a bum like that...what does it matter if she's a f-face like a sh-sh-eep?"

I tripped him neatly and landed on his stomach with both knees as he hit the floor with a crash that shook the house.

"You mean to tell me that you married me out of love?" I demanded. He raised his eyebrows, struggling to draw in breath.

"Have I not...just been...saying so?”
― Diana Gabaldon, quote from Outlander


“Is it really possible to tell someone else what one feels?”
― Leo Tolstoy, quote from Anna Karenina


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