"There is never a time or place for true love. It happens accidentally, in a heartbeat, in a single flashing, throbbing moment."
— Sarah Dessen (The Truth About Forever)

"Life is an awful, ugly place to not have a best friend."
— Sarah Dessen (Someone Like You)

"Love is needing someone. Love is putting up with someone's bad qualities because they somehow complete you."
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"Don't think or judge, just listen."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"No relationship is perfect, ever. There are always some ways you have to bend, to compromise, to give something up in order to gain something greater...The love we have for each other is bigger than these small differences. And that's the key. It's like a big pie chart, and the love in a relationship has to be the biggest piece. Love can make up for a lot."
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"Music is a total constant. That's why we have such a strong visceral connection to it, you know? Because a song can take you back instantly to a moment, or a place, or even a person. No matter what else has changed in your or the world, that one song says the same, just like that moment."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"I am coming to terms with the fact that loving someone requires a leap of faith, and that a soft landing is never guaranteed. "
— Sarah Dessen

"Some things don't last forever, but some things do. Like a good song, or a good book, or a good memory you can take out and unfold in your darkest times, pressing down on the corners and peering in close, hoping you still recognize the person you see there."
— Sarah Dessen

"Sometimes it seems safer to hold it all in, where the only person who can judge is yourself."
— Sarah Dessen

"There comes a time when the world gets quiet and the only thing left is your own heart. So you'd better learn the sound of it. Otherwise you'll never understand what it's saying."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"It's all in the view. That's what I mean about forever, too. For any one of us our forever could end in an hour, or a hundred years from now. You never know for sure, so you'd better make every second count."
— Sarah Dessen (The Truth About Forever)

"It's just that...I just think that some things are meant to be broken. Imperfect. Chaotic. It's the universe's way of providing contrast, you know? There have to be a few holes in the road. It's how life is."
— Sarah Dessen (The Truth About Forever)

"It's a lot easier to be lost than found. It's the reason we're always searching and rarely discovered--so many locks not enough keys."
— Sarah Dessen (Lock and Key)

"Because this is what happens when you try to run from the past. It just doesn’t catch up, it overtakes … blotting out the future."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"What is family? They were the people who claimed you. In good, in bad, in parts or in whole, they were the ones who showed up, who stayed in there, regardless. It wasn't just about blood relations or shared chromosomes, but something wider, bigger. We had many families over time. Our family of origin, the family we created, and the groups you moved through while all of this was happening: friends, lovers, sometimes even strangers. None of them perfect, and we couldn't expect them to be. You can't make any one person your world. The trick was to take what each could give you and build your world from it."
— Sarah Dessen

"You know, when it works, love is pretty amazing. It's not overrated. There's a reason for all those songs."
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"It was just one of those things," I said, "You know, that just happen. You don't think or plan. You just do it."
— Sarah Dessen (The Truth About Forever)

"You can't always get the perfect moment. Sometimes, you just have to do the best you can under the circumstances."
— Sarah Dessen

"What did it feel like, I wondered, to love someone that much? So much that you couldn't even control yourself when they came close, as if you might just break free of whatever was holding you and throw yourself at them with enough force to easily overwhelm you both."
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"No matter how much time has passed, these things still affect us and the world we live in. If you don't pay attention to the past, you'll never understand the future. It's all linked together."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"I wondered which was harder, in the end. The act of telling, or who you told it to. Or maybe if, when you finally got it out, the story was really all that mattered."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"Everyone has their weak spot. The one thing that, despite your best efforts, will always bring you to your knees, regardless of how strong you are otherwise."
— Sarah Dessen (Lock and Key)

"Hate Spinnerbait!"
— Sarah Dessen

"There has to be a middle. Without it, nothing can ever truly be whole. Because it is not just the space between, but also what holds everything together."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"We'd start slow, the way we always did, because the run, and the game, could go on for awhile. Maybe even forever.
That was the thing. You just never knew. Forever was so many different things. It was always changing, it was what everything was really all about. It was twenty minutes, or a hundred years, or just this instant, or any instant I wished would last and last. But there was only one truth about forever that really mattered, and that was this: it was happening. Right then, as I ran with Wes into that bright sun, and every moment afterwards. Look, there. Now. Now. Now."
— Sarah Dessen (The Truth About Forever)

"I was beginning to see, though, that the unknown wasn't always the greatest thing to fear. The people who know you best can be risker, because the words they say and things they think have the potential to be not only scary but true, as well."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"I thought again how you could never really know what you were seeing with just a glance, in motion, passing by. Good or bad, right or wrong. There was always so much more."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"I knew that there were no guarantees. No way of knowing what came next for me, or him, or anybody. Some things don't last forever, but some things do. Like a good song, or a good book, or a good memory you can take out and unfold in your darkest times, pressing down the corners and peering in close, hoping you still recognize the person you see there."
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"I had no illusions about love anymore. It came, it went, it left casualties or it didn't. People weren't meant to be together forever, regardless of what the songs say."
— Sarah Dessen

"We can't expect everybody to be there for us, all at once. So it's a lucky thing that really, all you need is someone. "
— Sarah Dessen (Lock and Key)

"The past did affect the present and the future, in ways you could see and a million ones you couldn't. Time wasn't a thing you could divide easily; there was no defined middle or beginning or end. I could pretend to leave the past begind, but it would not leave me."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"Anyone can hide. Facing up to things, working through them, that's what makes you strong."
— Sarah Dessen

"Sometimes, we just have to be happy with what people can offer us. Even if it's not what we want, at least it's something. "
— Sarah Dessen

"I just thought to my self, all of a sudden, that we had something in common. A natural chemistry, if you will. And I had a feeling that something big was going to happen. To both of us. That we were, in fact, meant to be together."
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"Pieces and parts were always easier to process. The full picture, the entire story, was another thing entirely. But you just never knew. Sometimes, people could surprise you."
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"Silence is so freaking loud
- Owen"
— Sarah Dessen (Just Listen)

"Holding people away from you, and denying yourself love, that doesn't make you strong. if anything, it makes you weaker. Because you're doing it out of fear."
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"Shoulda, coulda, woulda. It's so easy in the past tense. "
— Sarah Dessen (The Truth About Forever)

""I don't believe in failure, because simply by saying you've failed, you've admitted you attempted. And anyone who attempts is not a failure. Those who truly fail in my eyes are the ones who never try at all. The ones who sit on the couch and whine and moan and wait for the world to change for them.""
— Sarah Dessen (Keeping the Moon)

"There are some things in this world you rely on, like a sure bet. And when they let you down, shifting from where you've carefully placed them, it shakes your faith, right where you stand."
— Sarah Dessen (Someone Like You)

"You can't just plan a moment when things get back on track, just as you can't plan the moment you lose your way in the first place."
— Sarah Dessen (Someone Like You)

"This is exactly what i wanted, as commitments had never really been my thing. And it wasn't like it was hard, either. The only trick was never giving more than you were willing to lose."
— Sarah Dessen (Lock and Key)

"Life can be long or short, it all depends on how you choose to live it. it's like forever, always changing. for any of us our forever could end in an hour, or a hundred years from now. you can never know for sure, so you'd better make every second count. what you have to decide is how you want your life to be. if your forever was ending tomorrow, is this how you'd want to have spent it?"
— Sarah Dessen (The Truth About Forever)

"But if everything was always smooth and perfect, you'd get too used to that, you know? You have to have a little bit of disorganization now and then. Otherwise, you'll never really enjoy it when things go right."
— Sarah Dessen

"The fate of your heart is your choice and no one else gets a vote"
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"Maybe not," she said as we came to the car. "But maybe that isn't so bad. You can't love anyone that way more than once in a lifetime. It's too hard and it hurts too much when it ends. The first boy is always the hardest to get over, Haven. It's just the way the world works."
— Sarah Dessen (That Summer)

""I just thought to my self, all of a sudden, that we had something in common. A natural chemistry, if you will. And I had a feeling that something big was going to happen. To both of us. That we were, in fact, meant to be together."-Dexter"
— Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)

"No one could tell you: you just had to go through it on your own. If you were lucky, you came out on the other side and understood. If you didn't, you kept getting thrust back, retracing those steps, until you finally got it right."
— Sarah Dessen

"music is the greater uniter. An incredible force. Something the people who differ on everything and anything else can have in common"
— Sarah Dessen

"Don't think, or judge. Just listen."
— Sarah Dessen