“That was what people did when they wanted to stop a girl from doing something—they shamed her.”
“You, on the other hand, wish to know things. And no one can forgive a girl for that.”
“Why is it, she wondered now, that boys get to do things and be things and girls only get to watch?”
“We who have means and a voice must use them to help those who have neither. Yet how can we help them if we don't even know about them? And how can we know about them if no one writes about them? Is it so wrong to want to know things?”
“Sir, no amount of money, no matter how vast, could induce me to stroll, perambulate, promenade, or engage in any form of locomotion with you whatsoever. Good evening.”
“As a child, she’d thought all the noise and commotion was the most wild, wonderful game, but as she’d grown older, she understood why everyone rushed around so: they were chasing a story.”
“Headstrong is just a word, Katie - a word others call you when you don't do what they want.”
“No. I meant stay with me today. And tomorrow. And every day after.”
“I’d wish you good luck, but you won’t need it. You get to write your own story now. Nothing’s luckier than that.”
“Fac quod faciendum est,' " Jo read aloud. "Do what must be done.”
“And besides, I couldn't stay at the party. It was too dangerous. I nearly died."
"From what?"
"Boredom.”
“The thing is, you can't ever really know how rotten someone will turn out to be.”
“We who have means and a voice must use them to help those who have neither.”
“You, on the other hand, wish to know things. And no one can forgive a girl for that.”
“Sometimes you have to do wrong to do right.”
“He was a flame and she’d gotten burned, and the pain was terrible, yet it didn’t make the fire any less alluring.”
“Murder is not a suitable topic of conversation for a young lady.”
“Her fear was strong, but her need for the truth was stronger.”
“But you are a different sort of girl. Not at all what I expected you to be. And this is a different sort of time. And so I am hopeful for all the things you may yet find.”
“If you're going to bury the past, bury it deep, girl. Shallow Graves always give up their dead.”
“«Ένα ποτό, ένα τσιγάρο, καμία υποχρέωση να ευχαριστήσεις οποιονδήποτε άλλον εκτός από τον εαυτό σου. Ελευθερία. Αυτή είναι η απάντησή μου. Η ελευθερία να είσαι εσύ το καλύτερο πράγμα που σου συνέβη».”
“To have a purpose in life--what does that feel like?”
“Headstrong is just a word--a word others call you when you don't do what they want.”
“If only she could be bold enough, and brave enough, to claim the things she wanted: love, a purpose, a life. But could she be?”
“Asking questions, demanding explanations—these things always led to trouble”
“The truth can be a hard thing, Jo. It's often best left hidden.”
“Don't let the darkness that's been visited upon this family pull you in so deeply, you cannot get out. Turn back from it, darling Jo... he'd warned her. He didn't seem to understand that turning your back on the darkness didn't mean the darkness would turn its back on you.”
“The sky was a rich cloudless blue, the air still and dry, the maple trees glowing with glorious reds and oranges and yellows, and everywhere on Gardam Street squirrels bustled about with self-importance, burying their nuts in the most unlikely places.”
“This is ridiculous. You seem hell-bent on seeing on the good in me, yet you expect it to work some other way for you. I can't accept that.”
“Culture has tremendous inertia,” he said. “That’s why it’s culture. It works because it lasts. Culture strangles innovation in the crib.”
“The waste of intelligence. A community that finds it natural to suffocate with the care of home and children so many women’s intellectual energies is its own enemy and doesn’t realize it.” I waited in silence”
“The imagination is a horrible thing when it’s preoccupied with exactly how someone might try to kill you.”
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.