“Once you're out here in the world, nobody cares where you used to live. Who you are, that's what counts.”
― Jennifer R. Hubbard, quote from The Secret Year
“Believe me," he said, pointing his finger at me like a gun, "no good comes from lying about what you really want.”
― Jennifer R. Hubbard, quote from The Secret Year
“Like I told you on Thanksgiving, pretending is a lousy way to get through life.”
― Jennifer R. Hubbard, quote from The Secret Year
“What do you think about when you can't sleep? Sometimes I think about the ocean. I can see it lapping on the shore, waves rolling in one after the other, washing over the sand, never stopping. That's what usually puts me to sleep.”
― Jennifer R. Hubbard, quote from The Secret Year
“But we'd had only so many nights together, and the notebook had only so many pages, and that world was never going to get any bigger. The truth was that I couldn't have kept her even if she'd lived. At the end, we'd both been pushing at the walls of our secret world, pushing at each other. We'd given each other everything we could. It wasn't enough for either of us anymore.”
― Jennifer R. Hubbard, quote from The Secret Year
“But we'd only had so many nights together, and the notebook had so many pages, and the world was never going to get bigger.”
― Jennifer R. Hubbard, quote from The Secret Year
“When we reflect that her century was the brutalest, the wickedest, the rottenest in history since the darkest ages, we are lost in wonder at the miracle of such a product from such a soil. The contrast between her and her century is the contrast between day and night. She was truthful when lying was the common speech of men; she was honest when honesty was become a lost virtue; she was a keeper of promises when the keeping of a promise was expected of no one; she gave her great mind to great thoughts and great purposes when other great minds wasted themselves upon pretty fancies or upon poor ambitions; she was modest, and fine, and delicate when to be loud and coarse might be said to be universal; she was full of pity when a merciless cruelty was the rule; she was steadfast when stability was unknown, and honorable in an age which had forgotten what honor was; she was a rock of convictions in a time when men believed in nothing and scoffed at all things; she was unfailingly true to an age that was false to the core; she maintained her personal dignity unimpaired in an age of fawnings and servilities; she was of a dauntless courage when hope and courage had perished in the hearts of her nation; she was spotlessly pure in mind and body when society in the highest places was foul in both—she was all these things in an age when crime was the common business of lords and princes, and when the highest personages in Christendom were able to astonish even that infamous era and make it stand aghast at the spectacle of their atrocious lives black with unimaginable treacheries, butcheries, and beastialities.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Joan of Arc
“I was tired of secrets, tired of seeing things I was not supposed to see. And so I just cried.”
― John Grisham, quote from A Painted House
“I find that the only way to get through life is to picture myself in an entirely disconnected reality. I often imagine how people would react to my death. Mr Dunthorne's quavering voice as he makes the announcement. The shocked faces of my classmates. A playground bedecked with flowers. The empty stillness of a school corridor. Local news analysis. . . . The steady stoicism of my parents. . . . Candlelit vigils. . . . And finally, my glorious resurrection.”
― Joe Dunthorne, quote from Submarine
“A child, without toxic interference, will naturally become the person they are meant to be. André Chevalier”
― Nikki Sex, quote from Abuse
“Through my history's despite
and ruin, I have come
to its remainder, and here
have made the beginning
of a farm intended to become
my art of being here.
By it I would instruct
my wants: they should belong
to each other and to this place.
Until my song comes here
to learn its words, my art
is but the hope of song.
(Part 2 from History is Clearing, p 174)”
― Wendell Berry, quote from The Collected Poems, 1957-1982
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.