Quotes from The War that Saved My Life

“It had been awful, but I hadn't quit. I had persisted. In battle I had won.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“I wanted to say a lot of things, but, as usual, I didn't have the words for the thoughts inside my head.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“I don't know what to say," she said, after a pause. "I don't want to tell you a lie, and I don't know the truth."
It was maybe the most honest thing anyone had ever said to me.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“It was us, I thought. Jamie and me. We had fallen down a rabbit hole, fallen into Susan’s house, and nothing made sense, not at all, not anymore.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“But what do I do with them?" Miss Smith said "I've never been around children." "Feed them, bathe them, make sure they get plenty of sleep," the doctor said. "They're no more diffi cult than puppies, really." He grinned”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“Sourpuss,” she said, laughing. “Would it kill you to be grateful?” Maybe. Who knew?”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“And even if it felt like Mam hated me, she had to love me, didn’t she? She had to love me, because she was my mam, and Susan was just somebody who got stuck taking care of Jamie and me because of the war.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“You feel safer in your bedroom, but you’re actually much safer in the shelter.” It didn’t matter how I felt. She made me go into the shelter every time the sirens wailed. Men came and removed all the signposts from the roads around the village, so that when Hitler invaded he wouldn’t know where he was. When he invaded, we were to bury our radio. Jamie had already dug a hole for it in the garden. When Hitler invaded we were to say nothing, do nothing to help the enemy. If he invaded while I was out riding, I was to return home at once, as fast as possible by the shortest route. I’d know it was an invasion, not an air raid, because all the church bells would ring. “What if the Germans take Butter?” I asked Susan. “They won’t,” she said, but I was sure she was lying. “Bloody huns,” Fred muttered, when I went to help with chores. “They come here, I’ll stab ’em with a pitchfork, I will.” Fred was not happy. The riding horses, the Thortons’ fine hunters, were all out to grass, and the grass was good, but the hayfields had been turned over to wheat and Fred didn’t know how he’d feed the horses through the winter. Plus the Land Girls staying in the loft annoyed him. “Work twelve hours a day, then go out dancing,” he said. “Bunch of lightfoots. In my day girls didn’t act like that.” I thought the Land Girls seemed friendly, but I knew better than to say so to Fred. You could get used to anything. After a few weeks, I didn’t panic when I went into the shelter. I quit worrying about the invasion. I put Jamie up behind me on Butter”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“I stared at the paper. I said, “This isn’t reading. This is drawing.” “Writing,” she corrected. “It’s like buttons and hems. You’ve got to learn those before you can sew on the machine. You’ve got to know your letters before you can read.” I supposed so, but it was boring. When I said so she got up again and wrote something along the bottom of the paper. “What’s that?” I asked. “‘Ada is a curmudgeon,’” she replied. “Ada is a curmudgeon,” I copied at the end of my alphabet. It pleased me. After”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“Then I did what I should have done to start with. I taught myself to walk.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“After that it was easy. It was the most impossible thing I’d ever done, but it was also easy. I held on to Jamie, and I kept moving forward.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“Maggie ignored this. “I’ll be glad to come to the party. Home’s dreadful, you can’t imagine. I’ve never liked school, but now home’s worse. Mum’s in a funk all the time.” Every”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“After that, with help from Jamie, I left Susan little notes every day. Susan is a big frog. (That one made Jamie giggle.)”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“crippled. He’d been better as soon as his hooves were trimmed.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“expression, of mingled anger and disinterest, didn’t change. “Hello,” I said. She scowled. “Who’re you?” She didn’t recognize me. I dismounted Butter, landing carefully on my good left foot. I untied my crutches from the back of the saddle and swung myself forward, over the garden wall. “I’m Ada,” I said. Her expression turned to outrage as she realized who I was. “What the ’ell’s this?” she said. “Just who do you think”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“When Jamie had to use the toilet, soldiers passed him over their heads to the one at the end of the car, and back again when he was done.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“I didn’t know what to do. Susan was temporary. My foot was permanent.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

“Somehow Christmas was making me feel jumpy inside. All this talk about being together and being happy and celebrating - it felt threatening. Like I shouldn't be part of it. Like I wasn't allowed. And Susan wanted me to be happy, which was scarier still.”
― Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, quote from The War that Saved My Life

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“Nonsense,’ said Stephen, ‘it is the most wholesome cabbage I have ever come across in the whole of my career. I hope, Mr Herapath, that you are not going to join in the silly weak womanish unphilosophical mewling and puling about the cabbage. So it is a little yellow in certain lights, so it is a little sharp, so it smells a little strange: so much the better, say I. At least that will stop the insensate Phaeacian hogs from abusing it, as they abuse the brute creation, stuffing themselves with flesh until what little brain they have is drowned in fat. A virtuous esculent! Even its boldest detractors, ready to make the most hellish declarations and to swear through a nine-inch plank that the cabbage makes them fart and rumble, cannot deny that it cured their purpurae. Let them rumble till the heavens shake and resound again; let them fart fire and brimstone, the Gomorrhans, I will not have a single case of scurvy on my hands, the sea-surgeon’s shame, while there is a cabbage to be culled.”
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