Quotes from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“I don't want to be married just to be married. I can't think of anything lonelier than spending the rest of my life with someone I can't talk to, or worse, someone I can't be silent with.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“That's what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you to another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book. It's geometrically progressive - all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Reading good books ruins you for enjoying bad books.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Perhaps there is some secret sort of homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers. How delightful if that were true.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Men are more interesting in books than they are in real life.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Have you ever noticed that when your mind is awakened or drawn to someone new, that person's name suddenly pops up everywhere you go? My friend Sophie calls it coincidence, and Mr. Simpless, my parson friend, calls it Grace. He thinks that if one cares deeply about someone or something new one throws a kind of energy out into the world, and "fruitfulness" is drawn in. ”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“I love seeing the bookshops and meeting the booksellers-- booksellers really are a special breed. No one in their right mind would take up clerking in a bookstore for the salary, and no one in his right mind would want to own one-- the margin of profit is too small. So, it has to be a love of readers and reading that makes them do it-- along with first dibs on the new books.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“All my life I thought that the story was over when the hero and heroine were safely engaged -- after all, what's good enough for Jane Austen ought to be good enough for anyone. But it's a lie. The story is about to begin, and every day will be a new piece of the plot. ”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Life goes on." What nonsense, I thought, of course it doesn't. It's death that goes on.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Think of it! We could have gone on longing for one another and pretending not to notice forever. This obsession with dignity can ruin your life if you let it.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“I have gone to [this bookshop] for years, always finding the one book I wanted - and then three more I hadn’t known I wanted.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“I sometimes think I prefer suitors in books rather than right in front of me. How awful, backward, cowardly, and mentally warped that will be if it turns out to be true.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Isola doesn't approve of small talk and believes in breaking the ice by stomping on it.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“We clung to books and to our friends; they reminded us that we had another part to us.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“I am to cover the philosophical side of the debate and so far my only thought is that reading keeps you from going gaga.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Because there is nothing I would rather do than rummage through bookshops, I went at once to Hastings & Sons Bookshop upon receiving your letter. I have gone to them for years, always finding the one book I wanted - and then three more I hadn't known I wanted.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Then I imagined a lifetime of having to cry to get him to be kind, and I went back to no again.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“It was amazing to me then, and still is, that so many people who wander into bookshops don't really know what they're after--they only want to look around and hope to see a book that will strike their fancy. And then, being bright enough not to trust the publisher's blurb, they will ask the book clerk the three questions: (1) What is it about? (2) Have you read it? (3) Was it any good?”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“That's what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you onto another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book. It's geometrically progressive—all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Men are more interesting in books than they are in real life.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“My worries travel around in my head on their well worn path”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Naturally curly hair is a curse, and don't ever let anyone tell you different.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Your questions regarding that gentleman are very delicate, very subtle, very much like being smacked in the head with a mallet...it's a tuba among the flutes.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Will Thisbee gave me The Beginner's Cook-Book for Girl Guides. It was just the thing; the writer assumes you know nothing about cookery and writes useful hints - "When adding eggs, break the shells first.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“If I could have anything I wanted, I would choose story without end, and it seems I have lots of company in that.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Do you arrange your books alphabetically? (I hope not.)”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Treat a dog right and he'll treat you right. ... Cats is different, but I never held it against them.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“I am a grown woman-- mostly-- and I can guzzle champagne with whomever I choose.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

“Reading good books ruins you for enjoying bad books.”
― Mary Ann Shaffer, quote from The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

About the author

Popular quotes

“Oh, make no mistake. I am no callow, ardent youth. I am an elderly man, broken in health and body, and soon to die. I am a scientist and a philosopher. I, as all the generations of philosophers before me, know woman for what she is—her weaknesses and meannesses and immodesties and ignobilities, her earth-bound feet and her eyes that have never seen the stars. But—and the everlasting, irrefragable fact remains: Her feet are beautiful, her eyes are beautiful, her arms and breasts are paradise, her charm is potent beyond all charm that has ever dazzled man; and, as the pole willy nilly draws the needle, just so, willy nilly, does she draw man.”
― Jack London, quote from The Star Rover

“Los edificios y los adoquines y las escaleras y los callejones y las iglesias y los parques…, todo, la ciudad entera, nos perteneció por un precioso instante que era largo y ancho y, Stu, lo llenamos hasta el último resquicio.
Aquello era vivir.
Vivir de verdad”
― Annabel Pitcher, quote from Ketchup Clouds

“There is power in words.

There are words that bid us laugh and make us weep. Words to begin with and words to end by. Words that seize the hearts in our chests and squeeze them tight, that set the skin on our bones to tingling. Words so beautiful they shape us, forever change us, live inside us for as long as we have breath to speak them. There are forgotten words. Killing words. Great and frightening and terrible words. There are True words.

And then there are pictures.”
― Jay Kristoff, quote from Kinslayer

“Others, the subject of this book, are likewise privy to their unconscious streams of thought, but they must contend with unusually tumultuous and unpredictable emotions as well. The integration of these deeper, truly irrational sources with more logical processes can be a tortuous task, but, if successful, the resulting work often bears a unique stamp, a “touch of fire,” for what it has been through.”
― Kay Redfield Jamison, quote from Touched with Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament

“McCoy, drained and hollow-eyed, couldn't take his eyes off the life vest belonging to the boy who'd slipped away from the group during the night. The empty vest spooked McCoy. All its straps were still tightly tied-it looked like some trick that Houdini might've played. Then McCoy peered into the water and got another shock: the boy was floating below him, spread-eagled, about fifteen feet below the surface. He lay motionless until a current caught him; then it was as if he were flying in the depths. Jesus, McCoy thought, Mother of God. He started saying the rosary over and over. McCoy had never been overly religious; his mom was the spiritual one in the family. But now he began the process of what he'd later call his purification; he'd started asking God to forgive him of his sins. He was resolved to live but he was getting ready to die.”
― Doug Stanton, quote from In Harm's Way: The Sinking of the USS Indianapolis and the Extraordinary Story of Its Survivors

Interesting books

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.