Luis Alberto Urrea · 528 pages
Rating: (8.8K votes)
“...There was nothing one could do when love came. It was fast, and it was strong, and if it were not good, then surely God would not have allowed it such power.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Owls visited them at night. Some thought the owls were witches. Some thought they were angels of death. Some thought they were holy and brought blessings. Some thought they were the restless spirits of the dead. The cowboys thought they were owls.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“This is how Heaven works. They're practical. We are always looking for rays of light. For lightning bolts or burning bushes. But God is a worker, like us. He made the world — He didn't hire poor Indios to build it for him! God has worker's hands. Just remember — angels carry no harps. Angels carry hammers.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Everybody knew that being dead could put you in a terrible mood.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“On that long westward morning, all Mexicans still dreamed the same dream. They dreamed of being Mexican. There was no greater mystery.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Tomas led a young woman by the hand and walked up into the foothills. Millian, the miner from Rosario, had introduced her to the patron, already buying points for himself. He was no fool. And the girl, no fool either, lifted her skirts for Tomas as he knelt before her, licking his way up her thighs -brown and sweet as candy, at the same time, tart and salty, musky, silken and cold in the warm air, refreshing as the sorbet he licked in Culiacan back when he was a student. She was amazed that this bit of her body could the great master to his knees before her. She was perhaps the most beautiful girl on that whole plain, but he did not her name and felt no need to ask. He pressed his face to her underwear, redolent with the burning scent of her, and he pulled the cotton down, over the bright points of her hips , the shadowy curve of her belly, until the fog of dark hair came into his sight, soft in the moonlight, tickling his face as he bent down to her again. He pressed his lips on the mound of her, breathing her in, tasting her like a dog, as her skirts fell over his head and her fingers pulled his head tighter to her, her legs moving apart in the dark, her beauty falling around him, his greatest gift to him, this flavor, this smell, her scent.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“All these women, Huila thought: Mothers of God. These skinny, these dirty and toothless, these pregnant and shoeless. These with an issue of blood, and these with unsuckled breasts and children cold in the grave. These old forgotten ones too weak to work. These fat ones who milked all day. These twisted ones tied to their pallets, these barren ones, these married ones, these abandoned ones, these whores, these hungry ones, these thieves, these drunks, these mestizas, these lovers of other women, these Indians, and these littlest ones who faced unknowable tomorrows. Mothers of God. If it was a sin to think so, she would face God and ask Him why. “The”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“My friend,' he said, 'no one is more ired of religion than a priest.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“He couldn't believe she was real. She was like some dream, some story old men told youngsters. She made a fool out of him with the slightest grin or pout. She slept in his bed, not beside him, but around him, her aromatic legs and arms wrapped around him, her mouth against his throat, her beautiful thundercloud hair over his face, his chest. He kissed her hair. Took it to his fist and kissed it, breathed it...Oh my God, he thought. He didn't know what it was about her that made him more insane: her belly, or the pale friction of her thighs; the small of her back, or her armpits.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“-This young woman is an infernal abortion. She is Satan incarnate, for who is better to portray Satan than a rebellious woman?”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“If you were born to be a nail, you had to be hammered.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Cruz made the sign of the cross over them. He hefted his rifle onto his shoulder and walked away. His warriors followed, blessed by the Lord, reconciled, holy in this day He had made, and ready to shoot.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Who was to say that God did not use the coyote’s teeth to eat His gifts?”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Is it a crime to want to be good? she cried”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Bees are excellent engineers, better than even you. They are are hard workers...They are as brave as Indian warriors. And they make honey. Far better than humans, my friend.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Our power comes from the earth”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“I am in the earth and the earth is in me”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“They breathed. They felt their lungs fill the sky, and they let the dark clouds inside them flow out. Then they connected to the earth.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Gringos! They have copied us again”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“If you were born to be a nail, you cannot curse the hammer.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“P.S. Do no violence. Kill no one.”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
“Who was she to say that God did not use the coyote’s teeth to chew His gifts?”
― Luis Alberto Urrea, quote from The Hummingbird's Daughter
Luis Alberto Urrea
Born place: Tijuana, Mexico
See more on GoodReads
“Living on the surface of a planet, mass sucking at every bone and muscle, and nothing but gravity to keep your air close, seemed like a fast path to crazy.”
― quote from Leviathan Wakes
“After all, true power was the ability to manipulate others into wanting to do what you wanted them to do.”
― Marissa Honeycutt, quote from The Life of Anna: The Complete Story
“If the item of stolen property had been anything other than a book, it would have been confiscated. But a book is different—it is not just a material possession but the pathway to an enlightened mind, and thence to a well-ordered society,”
― Neal Stephenson, quote from The Diamond Age
“Told you I was gone for you … Think you know what that means. Think you might be feeling me the same way and that’s what you were wanting to tell me.” He ran this thumb along my jaw down to my neck. “Am I right?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Good,” he said, smiling. “That’s ours, Wild. What we have, how we build on it, and I don’t give a fuck if it makes sense or not. It was fast but I don’t care. People might not get it like we do but again” – he dipped closer – “I do not fuckin’ care. What I do care about is you, everything that involves you.”
― J. Daniels, quote from Four Letter Word
“People were like machines. They broke down. They rattled. They could burn you or maim you if you weren't careful. Her job was not only to figure out why this happened and who was to blame, but also to listen for the signs of it coming. Being sheriff, like being a mechanic, was as much the fine art of preventive maintenance as it was the cleaning up after a breakdown.”
― Hugh Howey, quote from Wool Omnibus Edition
The Thing About the...
The Blight of Muirwo...
Ancient Light
The Pox Party
Empire
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.
