“Sometimes you don't even know what you want until you find out you can't have it.”
― Meghan O'Rourke, quote from The Long Goodbye
“Nothing prepared me for the loss of my mother. Even knowing that she would die did not prepare me. A mother, after all, is your entry into the world. She is the shell in which you divide and become a life. Waking up in a world without her is like waking up in a world without sky: unimaginable.”
― Meghan O'Rourke, quote from The Long Goodbye
“One of the grubby truths about a loss is that you don't just mourn the dead person, you mourn the person you got to be when the lost one was alive. This loss might even be what affects you the most.”
― Meghan O'Rourke, quote from The Long Goodbye
“The people we most love do become a physical part of us, ingrained in our synapses, in the pathways where memories are created.”
― Meghan O'Rourke, quote from The Long Goodbye
“In the months that followed my mother's death, I managed to look like a normal person. I walked the street; I answered my phone; I brushed my teeth; most of the time. But I was not OK. I was in grief. Nothing seemed important. Daily tasks were exhausting. Dishes piled in the sink, knives crusted with strawberry jam. At one point I did not wash my hair for ten days. I felt that I had abruptly arrived at a terrible, insistent truth about the impermanence of everyday.”
― Meghan O'Rourke, quote from The Long Goodbye
“Gram left in the direction of the kitchen and Emma stood, intending to get out of Sean’s way, but when he stood, he grabbed her elbow and spun her around.
His mouth met hers, hot and hungry, and she wrapped her arms around his neck as she responded in kind. So what if he was temporary? She’d enjoy it while it lasted. His hands were on her hips and he pulled her closer—close enough so she could feel he wasn’t pretending to want her.
The kiss was incredible and she stood on tiptoe, reaching for more. Her fingertips found the back of his neck and she stroked him from the knot at the top of his spine and up into his hair and back.
Sean pulled away from her so fast she almost fell over. “Shit.”
“Flattering.” Her senses were still so overwhelmed by him she didn’t trust herself to say more.”
― Shannon Stacey, quote from Yours to Keep
“Peut-être que vous étiez allongé au lit, presque sur le point de vous endormir, et vous avez ri de quelque chose, une plaisanterie toute personnelle, une bonne façon de finir la journée. C'est ça, mon nom.”
― Richard Brautigan, quote from The Tokyo-Montana Express
“Mawu felt her face where the still-fresh scar had just been opened up again. She examined the blood on her fingers as if it weren’t her own. Sir returned to the table and a servant slipped through the side door and passed him a wet cloth to wipe the blood from his hands.”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“Here's a suggestion you might want to pay attention to. Try to forget everything you learned on Oprah and if you can't do that, at least refrain from regurgitating that crap at me. It spoils my appetite.”
― Samantha Young, quote from Scorched Skies
“A single action can cause a life to veer off in a direction it was never meant to go. Falling in love can do that, you think. And so can a wild party. You marvel at the way each has the power to forever alter an individual's compass. And it is the knowing that such a thing can so easily happen, as you did not know before, not really, that has fundamentally changed you and your son.”
― Anita Shreve, quote from Testimony
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.