Samantha H. > Samantha's Quotes

“You love me. Real or not real?"
I tell him, "Real.”
― Suzanne Collins, Mockingjay

“I had never thought about it, but summer was Dill by the fishpool smoking string, Dill's eyes alive with complicated plans to make Boo Radley emerge; summer was the swiftness with which Dill would reach up and kiss me when Jem was not looking, the longings we sometimes felt each other feel. With him, life was routine; without him, life was unbearable”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

“It was a pleasure to burn.
It was a special pleasure to see things eaten, to see things blackened and changed. With the brass nozzle in his fists, with this great python spitting its venomous kerosene upon the world, the blood pounded in his head, and his hands were the hands of some amazing conductor playing all the symphonies of blazing and burning to bring down the tatters and charcoal ruins of history. With his symbolic helmet numbered 451 on his stolid head, and his eyes all orange flame with the thought of what came next, he flicked the igniter and the house jumped up in a gorging fire that burned the evening sky red and yellow and black. He strode in a swarm of fireflies. He wanted above all, like the old joke, to shove a marshmallow on a stick in the furnace, while the flapping pigeon-winged books died on the porch and lawn of the house. While the books went up in sparkling whirls and blew away on a wind turned dark with burning.”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“Gaman. The ability to hold your pain and bitterness inside you and not let them destroy you. To make something beautiful through your anger, or with your anger, and neither erase it nor let it define you. To suffer. And to rage. And to persevere.”
― Traci Chee, We Are Not Free

“Dreams don't have timelines, deadlines, and aren't always in straight lines.”
― Jason Reynolds, For Every One

“Where her books were, she was. Get the books right and the rest will follow. Now she could address the rest of the room.”
― Maureen Johnson, Truly Devious

“I forgot about this. People who can laugh at shitty things. People who don't think the sky is falling when something small goes wrong.
They call it perspective. Or being jaded. Or worse, a grateful attitude.
Really, it's just survival. A word I hate as much as I own.”
― Kristin Dwyer, Some Mistakes Were Made

“And this is why tears are falling down my cheeks. Not because of Sandry's kindness, but because of all the people who are supposed to be kind and aren't.”
― Kristin Dwyer, Some Mistakes Were Made

“Autumn leaves don't fall, they fly. They take their time and wander on this their only chance to soar.”
― Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing

“Is there anything better than iced coffee and a bookstore on a sunny day? I mean, aside from hot coffee and a bookstore on a rainy day.”
― Emily Henry, Book Lovers

“The only two ways I've ever managed to get out of my head are through reading and rigorous exercise.”
― Emily Henry, Book Lovers

“High school matters because it shapes how we see the world when we enter it. We carry the hurt with us, the confirmed fears, the insecurities people used against us. But we also carry the moment when someone gave us a chance, even though they didn't have to. The moment we watched a friend make a choice we didn't understand at first because they're brave in a different way. The moment a teacher told us they believed in us. The moment we told someone who we are and they accepted us without question. The moment we felt in love.
"Most of the things we are feeling right now are things we're feeling for the first time. We're learning what it means to feel them. What we mean to one another. Of course that matters.”
― Casey McQuiston, I Kissed Shara Wheeler

“Shame is a way of life here. It's stocked in the vending machines, stuck like gum under the desks. Spoken in morning devotionals. She knows now that there's a bit of it in her.

It was an easy choice not to go back in the closet when she got here, but if she'd grown up here, she might never have come out at all. She might be a completely different person.”
― Casey McQuiston, I Kissed Shara Wheeler

“I chose to stay awake, this time lulled by the sounds of a very special mixtape made for me by a very special boy who just might have my heart.”
― E. S. Rosalynn

“Maybe there was still hope for my brain to regain some sense of normalcy instead of replaying the skipping mixtape in my head. Maybe if I could get all of my memories back, then maybe, just maybe, I could feel like myself again.”
― E. S. Rosalynn

“It was as if our voices were meant to sing together.”
― E. S. Rosalynn

“It was as if our voices were meant to sing together.”
― E.S. Rosalynn, MIXTAPE: Volume One

“Maybe there was still hope for my brain to regain some sense of normalcy instead of replaying the skipping mixtape in my head. Maybe if I could get all of my memories back, then maybe, just maybe, I could feel like myself again.”
― E.S. Rosalynn, MIXTAPE: Volume One

“I chose to stay awake, this time lulled by the sounds of a very special mixtape made for me by a very special boy who just might have my heart.”
― E.S. Rosalynn, MIXTAPE: Volume One

“Sometimes books don't find us until the right time.”
― Gabrielle Zevin, The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

“We are not quite novels.
We are not quite short stories.
In the end, we are collected works.”
― Gabrielle Zevin, The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

“You tell a kid he doesn't like to read, and he'll believe you”
― Gabrielle Zevin, The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

“A place is not really a place without a bookstore.”
― Gabrielle Zevin, The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

“Teachers assign it, and parents are happy because their kids are reading something of 'quality.' But it's forcing kids to read books like that that make them think they hate reading.”
― Gabrielle Zevin, The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

“When people pity you, it's like they don't realize that the exact same thing is coming for them. And then I feel embarrassed and uncomfortable and have to pity them, because, like, do you not realize that it's always someone's turn? You haven't noticed everyone gets a few blows that seem so big you can't survive them?”
― Emily Henry, A Million Junes

“Nothing sounds better tonight than living my small life well.”
― Emily Henry, A Million Junes

“You know, I think my favorite parts of life are the things I didn't know I wanted.”
― Emily Henry, A Million Junes

“And yet I keep moving forward. On some days, I’m afraid, but most days, I simply want to achieve those things I dream of.”
― Rebecca Ross, Divine Rivals

“But I realize that people are just people, and they carry their own set of fears, dreams, desires, pains, and mistakes. I can’t expect someone else to make me feel complete; I must find it on my own.”
― Rebecca Ross, Divine Rivals

“Keep writing. You will find the words you need to share. They are already within you, even in the shadows, hiding like jewels.”
― Rebecca Ross, Divine Rivals