“But if you were Charlotte, and you had been feeling that life was some cosmic joke that had no punchline, and in the space of a moment you had gone from being Charlotte-without-a-kitten to being Charlotte-with-a-kitten, you too would have found it nothing short of remarkable.”
― Anne Ursu, quote from The Shadow Thieves
“Teachers loved to say people had potential; that's what teachers did to keep themselves from getting canned. What were they supposed to say-I'm sorry, your kid has no promise whatsoever? She's utterly mediocre in every way?”
― Anne Ursu, quote from The Shadow Thieves
“Charlotte sighed inwardly. She knew her mother was serious when she started referring to shellfish. What did that mean, anyway? What's so great about the world being your oyster? Does that mean it's really hard to open, and when you do, you have something slimy and gross on the inside?”
― Anne Ursu, quote from The Shadow Thieves
“She did not like seeing her loved ones like this, bent over with sorrow; everything in her wanted to cry out, to thrash and scream at the sight of it. But she knew that great grief came from great love, and that their grief was an honor to her. And she did love them so very much.”
― Anne Ursu, quote from The Shadow Thieves
“If shadows were caused by the interplay between light and Life, a child's was still forming. An adult's was inextricably bound to his body, but a child had a tenuous relationship to his own permanence, and thus, his own shadow.”
― Anne Ursu, quote from The Shadow Thieves
“I clench my fist around your stiffness, and your breathing quickens as I draw it back and forth. After your warm, sticky release, I lick my hand clean. Then I bury my face in your wild, stinking hair and hold you. To hold you is to be at one with you. To be at one with the starry cosmos of ancient gods above. As I hold you I will the night never to end. For our oneness fades with the disappearing stars. And by daylight you are other again.”
― Susan Barker, quote from The Incarnations
“Things can stay safe for long
they can pretend to fit
but then you hear Discord's song
and things crack bit by bit.”
― Dawn Kurtagich, quote from The Creeper Man
“All being, it seemed, was built on opposites, on division. Man or woman, vagabond or citizen, lover or thinker — no breath could both be in and out, none could be man and wife, free and yet orderly, knowing the urge of life and the joy of intellect. Always the one paid for the other, though each was equally precious and essential.”
― Hermann Hesse, quote from Narziss und Goldmund
“She cast her fragrance and her radiance over me. I ought never to have run away from her... I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little stratagems. Flowers are so inconsistent! But I was too young to know how to love her...”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, quote from Pangeran Kecil
“Look, I might biologically be a sphinx, but I’m an imp in every other way that counts. That means I’m unmanageable, stubborn, secretive, I don’t like rules, and I make people tired and irritated – and I take pride in it.”
― Suzanne Wright, quote from Burn
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.