Quotes from The Problem Child

Michael Buckley ·  320 pages

Rating: (17K votes)


“The only bad ideas are the ones never tried.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“By the way, you don't need the makeup." Puck said.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“He did something so un-Pucklike, Sabrina couldn’t believe it. He got up sat behind her, and let his enormous fairy wings sprout from his back. Then he wrapped them around her to keep the bitter cold away. It was the first truly nice thing the so-called Trickster King had ever done for her.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“Sabrina?”
“Daphne! Are you okay?”
“Yes. Sabrina?”
“What?”
“I hate you!” the little girl screamed.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“came out to this site and do you know what I heard?” There was a brief silence and then a loud, squeaky fart. Sabrina turned and saw Puck fall over with laughter. For once, one of his childish pranks was well timed.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child



“Puck was a genuine pain in the butt, but he had powers and those powers made him useful.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“Sabrina shook off her surprise and together they took turns kicking the stranger.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“You want me to be your boyfriend, don’t you?” Puck taunted. His wings suddenly popped out of his back and he swooped over to Sabrina. Before she knew how to react, the boy kissed her on the lips. A million thoughts ran through Sabrina’s head at once. Puck was annoying. He had dumped her in vats of disgusting glop. He’d put creepy crawlers in her bed. But the most awful thought of them all was the one about the kiss—it was nice.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“The more the girls heard, the more it became clear that Uncle Jake and their straight-laced father had been first-class juvenile delinquents.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“The only bad ideas are the ones never tried,” Puck”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child



“Puck helped her out the door, wrapping his arm around her and guiding her through the snowdrifts.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“The library spilled onto the floor and into the other rooms. Some books held up wobbly tables, others were literally swept under the rug. Sabrina had once found a book inside the toilet tank.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


“The little girl in the red cloak who had taken her parents was Little Red Riding Hood!”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Problem Child


About the author

Michael Buckley
Born place: Akron, Ohio, The United States
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“Boys will be boys, and ballplayers will always be arrested adolescents at heart. The proof comes in the mid-afternoon of an early spring training day, when 40 percent of the New York Mets’ starting rotation—Mike Pelfrey and I—hop a chain-link fence to get onto a football field not far from Digital Domain. We have just returned from Dick’s Sporting Goods, where we purchased a football and a tee. We are here to kick field goals. Long field goals. A day before, we were all lying on the grass stretching and guys started talking about football and field-goal kickers, and David Wright mentioned something about the remarkable range of kickers these days. I can kick a fifty-yard field goal, Pelfrey says. You can not, Wright says. You don’t think so? You want to bet? You give me five tries and I’ll put three of them through. One hundred bucks says you can’t, David says. This is going to be the easiest money I ever make. I am Pelf’s self-appointed big brother, always looking out for him, and I don’t want him to go into this wager cold. So I suggest we get a ball and tee and do some practicing. We get back from Dick’s but find the nearby field padlocked, so of course we climb over the fence. At six feet two inches and 220 pounds, I get over without incident, but seeing Pelf hoist his big self over—all six feet seven inches and 250 pounds of him—is much more impressive. Pelf’s job is to kick and my job is to chase. He sets up at the twenty-yard line, tees up the ball, and knocks it through—kicking toe-style, like a latter-day Lou Groza. He backs up to the twenty-five and then the thirty, and boots several more from each distance. Adding the ten yards for the end zone, he’s now hit from forty yards and is finding his range. Pretty darn good. He insists he’s got another ten yards in his leg. He hits from forty-five, and by now he’s probably taken fifteen or seventeen hard kicks and reports that his right shin is getting sore. We don’t consider stopping. Pelf places the ball on the tee at the forty-yard line: a fifty-yard field goal. He takes a half dozen steps back, straight behind the tee, sprints up, and powers his toe into the ball … high … and far … and just barely over the crossbar. That’s all that is required. I thrust both my arms overhead like an NFL referee. He takes three more and converts on a second fifty-yarder. You are the man, Pelf, I say. Adam Vinatieri should worry for his job. That’s it, Pelf says. I can’t even lift my foot anymore. My shin is killing me. We hop back over the fence, Pelf trying to land as lightly as a man his size can land. His shin hurts so much he can barely put pressure on the gas pedal. He’s proven he can hit a fifty-yard field goal, but I go into big-brother mode and tell him I don’t want him kicking any more field goals or stressing his right leg any further. I convince him to drop the bet with David. The last thing you need is to start the season on the DL because you were kicking field goals, I say. Can you imagine if the papers got ahold of that one? The wager just fades away. David doesn’t mind; he gets a laugh at the story of Pelf hopping the fence and practicing, and drilling long ones.”
― quote from Wherever I Wind Up: My Quest for Truth, Authenticity and the Perfect Knuckleball


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