Gregor the Overlander Collection (Underland Chronicles #1-5)

by Suzanne Collins

Every patch on the quilt had come from a dress she had made for herself through the years. In her more lucid moments, she’d talk Gregor through the quilt.

His mom said Boots never knew a stranger, which meant she thought everybody in the world was her friend.

His dad was crazy about science, and it seemed as if he wanted to pour everything in his brain right into Gregor’s head. It was a little dangerous, because even a simple question could bring on a half-hour explanation.

His grandma had always said, “Ask your daddy the time, and he tells you how to make a clock.”

The Underland was no secret to the Native Americans, who had made periodic trips below the earth for ritual purposes for hundreds of years.

Of course!

these rats were purely terrifying.

six feet tall,

The mighty warrior excused himself and changed a diaper.

“It’s a song we sing with babies in the Overland,” said Gregor. “She put you in it. That’s a big honor,” he said. “She only puts someone in a song if she really likes them.”

Two years old

Boots was special weaponry after all.

“A child shall lead them…”

Root beer! He yanked out the can shaking it with all his might. “Attack! Attack!” he yelled.

“Beeg bugs,” she said, pointing to the first puddle. “Bats,” she said, pointing to the second. Both sets of animals obligingly drank up the root beer.

Every day when I wake I tell myself that it

Momento mori

will be my last. If you are not trying to hold on to time, you are not so afraid of losing it.”

Momento mori

Gregor thought this was the single saddest thing anyone had ever said to h...

“And then, if you make it to bedtime, you feel the joy of cheating death out of one more da...

From now on, he felt an allegiance to the roaches that he knew would never fade. He would never again take a roach’s life.

Then he could stop having to make hard decisions. He could just be a kid. But the man before him was even needier than Boots was.

Well, Boots’s courage might only count when she could count, but her ability to love counted all the time.

“If I rub the needle with the lodestone, I’ll magnetize it. Basically I’ll turn it into a compass needle.

Even if times got bad, he would never again deny himself the possibility that the future might be happy even if the present was painful.

He would allow himself dreams.

“Well, then, Gregor, I know the gift I would wish to give you, but you can only find it yourself,” said Vikus. “What is it?” said Gregor. “Hope,” said Vikus. “There are times it will be very hard to find. Times when it will be much easier to choose hate instead. But if you want to find peace, you must first be able to hope it is possible.”

can’t take three lasagnas to the fund-raiser. People take two. You walk in with three and everybody thinks you’re a big show-off.

They rode the subway to Central Park, where there was a great sledding hill. Lots of people were there, some with fancy sleds, some with beat-up old saucers.

One guy was just sliding down on a big trash bag.

“No. More legs, I will grow, more legs,” said Temp. He didn’t seem too upset about the loss.

do toes. Whew! I do bekfast. Two times,” Boots said, holding up four fingers. She squatted down and pressed her nose into his forehead so their eyes were blinking at each other upside down. “I see you,” she said.

Everything bad was worse at the holidays, he knew that from the years of his dad’s absence. All around you were people in an extra-happy mood, and it just made your own hurt bigger.

“You know other things,” said Gregor. “About what goes on in the Overland, even.” “Well, I’ve spent a lot of time in your libraries at night,” said Ripred. “You come up and read books?” asked Gregor. “Read them, eat them, whatever mood strikes me,” he said. “All right, Overlander, you may leave the pup with me. I won’t kill it, but I can’t promise I can teach it much. And you know, there will be hell to pay in Regalia.”

Claws were scratching now with purpose, trying to dig through the plaster.

Scary maybe to an 11-year-old reader

Gregor looked at her sitting on the couch, still in her waitress uniform, and thought that if anyone deserved a little star treatment, it was his mom.

Boots, riding comfortably on Temp’s back, was having a fine time teaching him “The Alphabet Song.” The roach held his own up to about the letter L, but that whole L-M-N-O-P run kept throwing him off track.

The more he thought, the more his mind reeled in confusion. We were right to fight. It was wrong to fight. We had to fight. It was pointless to fight. He simply did not know where he stood, and it made him feel crazy. No wonder Hamnet had run off to the jungle.

How come you’re giving your doughnut to some smart-alecky rat who’s the only one who can take care of himself?” “Because I think he’s lonely,” said Lizzie softly.

Awwww!

Today he told the old standby: “Why is six afraid of seven? Because seven ate nine.”

One person flew around like a bat and their partner had to coax them to their side by pretending to offer them food. There were specific steps and hand gestures that went with the words, as Gregor had suspected.

They did not take a watch together that night. Gregor didn’t want to argue with Luxa. What he wanted was to think up an answer to her question that would dazzle everyone. The problem was…he didn’t know what else could be done about the rats abusing the nibblers. If they didn’t use force, how could the humans stop them? He knew the rats would not listen to talk. Since the plague, the humans had given the rats a lot of food and medicine to make up for unleashing the disease, but it had not erased the bitterness.

The breeze ruffled her hair, pushing it back from her face, giving him a clear shot of her eyes. They were asking for an answer. Needing to know if she could count on him.

“They saved your life,” he said. And for just a moment, Luxa’s face softened and she smiled.

model patient while he worked things out in his head.

“It was just a puzzle, Gregor, not what really happened,” said Lizzie. “In the puzzle the rat ate the cheese.” “How did you know that? Did you just guess?” asked Gregor. “No, it was just the only answer left. He said the mouse didn’t eat the cheese. And the two animals who ate mushrooms and cookies weren’t mammals, so that means the spider and the cockroach didn’t eat the cheese. And cheese wasn’t one of the favorite foods of the Overlander, the Underlander, or the bat. So, that only leaves the rat. See?” said Lizzie.

“Nothing. Sometimes I tape a light here to help me see,” said Gregor, indicating his forearm. “That is all?” Miravet gave his forearm a slightly disapproving look, as if it wasn’t holding up its end of the bargain somehow.

“I only hear bits and pieces. I know a war started. I see them carrying the wounded past my room sometimes. You going to tell me about it?” she asked. Gregor shook his head without lifting it. “And I can’t make you anymore. I know that,” said his mom. She gave the back of his neck a squeeze. “Just tell me this. The family doing okay?”

Suddenly he felt his hand reaching into his pocket and pulling out the photo of them dancing. The one that had convinced Solovet he was crazy about Luxa. He placed it on her tray. “This is the reason I don’t have bodyguards,” he said, and promptly headed for the door, too afraid to see her reaction.

he’d had a big brother, he would have wanted him to be just like Howard. Someone who was kind and brave and not afraid to say he cared about things or to admit he’d been wrong.

“It’s ideal really. They will come up with a plan. No one will like it. Everyone will feel they have been treated unfairly, but will be happy that their neighbors feel the same. And that is the nature of compromise.

Remember, it’s a lot easier to lose your head than to keep it.”

“It’s like this. You spend your whole childhood hearing about being nice to other people and how hurting someone’s a crime, and then they ship you off to some war and tell you to kill. What’s that going to do to your head, huh?”