Jenn > Jenn's Quotes

“The first thing you find out when yer dog learns to talk is that dogs don't got nothing much to say.
About anything.
"Need a poo, Todd."
"Shutup, Manchee."
"Poo. Poo, Todd."
"I said shut it.”
― Patrick Ness, The Knife of Never Letting Go

“It's funny how you can forget everything except people loving you. Maybe that's why humans find it so hard getting over love affairs. It's not the pain they're getting over, it's the love.”
― Melina Marchetta, On the Jellicoe Road

“What do you want from me?" he asks.
What I want from every person in my life, I want to tell him.
More.”
― Melina Marchetta, Jellicoe Road

“We believe in ordinary acts of bravery, in the courage that drives one person to stand up for another.”
― Veronica Roth, Divergent

“Dirge Without Music

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.

Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.
Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.
A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,
A formula, a phrase remains,—but the best is lost.

The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love,—
They are gone. They are gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled
Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve.
More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.

Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.”
― Edna St. Vincent Millay, Collected Poems

“It's like being in love, discovering your best friend.”
― Elizabeth Wein, Code Name Verity

“KISS ME, HARDY! Kiss me, QUICK!”
― Elizabeth Wein, Code Name Verity

“FLY THE PLANE, MADDIE.”
― Elizabeth Wein, Code Name Verity

“Silence is not just about secrecy, Your Majesty. It is grief and it is shame.”
― Melina Marchetta, Froi of the Exiles

“Tell me what to wish for." Tell me what to ask the sea for."
"To be happy. Happiness."
"I don't think such a thing is had on Thisby. And if it is, I don't know how you would keep it."
"You whisper to it. What it needs to hear. Isn't that what you said?"
"That's what I said. What do I need to hear?"
"That tomorrow we'll rule the Scorpio Races as king and queen of Skarmouth and I'll save the house and you'll have your stallion. Dove will eat golden oats for the rest of her days and you will terrorize the races each year and people will come from every island in the world to find out how it is you get horses to listen to you. The piebald will carry Mutt Malvern into the sea and Gabriel will decide to stay on the island. I will have a farm and you will bring me bread for dinner."
"That's what I needed to hear.”
― Maggie Stiefvater, The Scorpio Races

“I say, 'I will not be your weakness, Sean Kendrick.'
Now he looks at me. He says, very softly, 'It's late for that, Puck.”
― Maggie Stiefvater, The Scorpio Races

“I hear laughter and someone asks if I need help, not in a nice way. I snarl, 'What I need is for your mother to have thought a little harder nine months before your birthday.”
― Maggie Stiefvater, The Scorpio Races

“That's a poor match, Sean Kendrick," says a voice at my elbow. It's the other sister from Fathom & Sons, and she follows my gaze to Puck. "Neither of you are a housewife."
I don't look away from Puck. "I think you assume too much, Dory Maud."
"You leave nothing to assumption," Dory Maud says. "You swallow her with your eyes. I'm surprised there's any of her left for the rest of us to see.”
― Maggie Stiefvater, The Scorpio Races

“Do you know how to wrap a leg?'
'I was born wrapping legs,' I say stiffly, because I'm insulted.
'Must've been a challenging delivery,' Sean notes.”
― Maggie Stiefvater, The Scorpio Races

“No 'Glory shall be your reward' for me. Oh, no, for me, it is, 'Stop whining' and 'Go to bed'.”
― Megan Whalen Turner, The King of Attolia

“If you are feeling more yourself, there is a problem best addressed immediately," said the queen.
"In my nightshirt?" The king wriggled, as ever, out of straightforward obedience.
"Your attendants. I have spoken to them. You will speak to them as well."
"Ah. They have seen me in my nightshirt." He looked down at his sleeve, embroidered with white flowers. "Not in your nightshirt, though.”
― Megan Whalen Turner, The King of Attolia

“Then come out," said the king, helping him, "knowing you'll never die of a fall unless the god himself drops you.”
― Megan Whalen Turner, The King of Attolia

“Relius looked away. "He said that you...cried," he said softly.
"But not that he cried as well," said the queen, amused at the memory. "We were very lachrymose... would you like to hear more romance of the evening? He told me the Guard should be reduced by half, and I threw an ink jar at his head."
"Is that when he cried?"
"He ducked," said Attolia dryly.
"I had not pictured you for a fishwife."
"Lo, the transforming power of love.”
― Megan Whalen Turner, The King of Attolia

“Why did you come if not to murder my king?"
"I came to steal his magus."
"You can't," said the magus in question.
"I can steal anything," Eugenides corrected him, "even with one hand.”
― Megan Whalen Turner, The Queen of Attolia

“Arjuro made a scoffing sound. ‘You think Lumatere will invade because of you? Are you that important?’

Froi looked away. ‘Isaboe would invade if you kidnapped a servant, let alone a friend.’

‘Isaboe? We’re on first-name terms with the Queen of Lumatere, are we?’ Gargarin asked.

Froi found himself bristling. ‘What? Do you think I’m some cutthroat for hire who they found hanging around the palace walls with the words “I want
to kill a Charynite King” tattooed on my arse?”
― Melina Marchetta, Froi of the Exiles

“ ‘I’m fairly bursting tae ken how ye guessed I spoke Scots?’ Lymond looked up. Superficial pain, withstood or ignored for quite a long time, had made his eyes heavy, but they were brimming with laughter. ‘Well, God,’ he said. ‘In the water, you were roaring your head off at a bloody bull elephant called Hughie.”
― Dorothy Dunnett, Queens' Play

“And the English army, wheeling, started south at a gallop over the hill pass into Ettrick, followed by twenty men and eight hundred sheep in steel helmets.”
― Dorothy Dunnett, The Disorderly Knights

“Froi saw the rage in Arjuro’s eyes, his clenched fists.

‘If I could find the men who did those things to you as a child I would tear them limb from limb.’

Froi embraced him.

‘One day,’ Froi said, clearing his voice of emotion, ‘I’ll introduce you to my queen and my king and my captain; and Lord August and Lady Abian, who have given me a home; and the Priestking and Perri and Tesadora and my friend Lucian; and then you’ll understand that I would never have met them if you hadn’t journeyed to Sarnak all those years ago, Arjuro. And if the gods were to give me a choice between living a better life, having not met them, or a wretched life with the slightest chance of crossing their path, then I'd pick the wretched life over and over again.’

He kissed Arjuro’s brow. Finnikin called it a blessing between two male blood kin. It always had made Froi ache seeing it between Finnikin and Trevanion.

‘I'd live it again just to have crossed all of your paths. Keep safe, Arjuro. Keep safe so I can bring your brother home to you.”
― Melina Marchetta, Quintana of Charyn

“She made a sound of regret. ‘We come second, you and I, Luc-ien,’ she said. ‘Our allegiance is always to our kingdoms. Without that allegiance, our people would fall.’

She placed her head back against his chest and he felt her tears. ‘This is not our time.’

‘But that will never mean I love you less,’ he said.”
― Melina Marchetta, Quintana of Charyn

“Many people, myself among them, feel better at the mere sight of a book.”
― Jane Smiley, Thirteen Ways of Looking at the Novel

“I don’t have many friends, not the living, breathing sort at any rate. And I don’t mean that in a sad and lonely way; I’m just not the type of person who accumulates friends or enjoys crowds. I’m good with words, but not spoken kind; I’ve often thought what a marvelous thing it would be if I could only conduct relationships on paper. And I suppose, in a sense, that’s what I do, for I’ve hundreds of the other sort, the friends contained within bindings, pages after glorious pages of ink, stories that unfold the same way every time but never lose their joy, that take me by the hand and lead me through doorways into worlds of great terror and rapturous delight. Exciting, worthy, reliable companions - full of wise counsel, some of them - but sadly ill-equipped to offer the use of a spare bedroom for a month or two.”
― Kate Morton, The Distant Hours

“I'm the Cool One," she told herself. "Somebody give me some tequila because I'll totally drink it. And there's no way you're going to find me later having a panic attack in your parents' bathroom. Who wants to French-kiss?”
― Rainbow Rowell, Fangirl

“Who am I, that you should love me?"
"You are My Queen," said Eugenides. She sat perfectly still, looking at him without moving as his words dropped like water into dry earth.
"Do you believe me?" he asked.
"Yes," she answered.
"Do you love me?"
"Yes."
"I love you."
And she believed him.”
― Megan Whalen Turner, The Queen of Attolia

“Deadlines just aren't real to me until I'm staring one in the face.”
― Rick Riordan, The Lightning Thief

“We only came close to dying six or seven times, which I thought was pretty good. Once, I lost my grip and found myself dangling by one hand from a ledge fifty feet above the rocky surf. But I found another handhold and kept climbing. A minute later Annabeth hit a slippery patch of moss and her foot slipped. Fortunately, she found something else to put it against. Unfortunately, that something was my face.
"Sorry," she murrmured.
"S'okay," I grunted, though I'd never really wanted to know what Annabeth's sneaker tasted like.”
― Rick Riordan, The Sea of Monsters