Katie > Katie's Quotes

“Fat’ is usually the first insult a girl throws at another girl when she wants to hurt her.

I mean, is ‘fat’ really the worst thing a human being can be? Is ‘fat’ worse than ‘vindictive’, ‘jealous’, ‘shallow’, ‘vain’, ‘boring’ or ‘cruel’? Not to me; but then, you might retort, what do I know about the pressure to be skinny? I’m not in the business of being judged on my looks, what with being a writer and earning my living by using my brain…

I went to the British Book Awards that evening. After the award ceremony I bumped into a woman I hadn’t seen for nearly three years. The first thing she said to me? ‘You’ve lost a lot of weight since the last time I saw you!’

‘Well,’ I said, slightly nonplussed, ‘the last time you saw me I’d just had a baby.’

What I felt like saying was, ‘I’ve produced my third child and my sixth novel since I last saw you. Aren’t either of those things more important, more interesting, than my size?’ But no – my waist looked smaller! Forget the kid and the book: finally, something to celebrate!

I’ve got two daughters who will have to make their way in this skinny-obsessed world, and it worries me, because I don’t want them to be empty-headed, self-obsessed, emaciated clones; I’d rather they were independent, interesting, idealistic, kind, opinionated, original, funny – a thousand things, before ‘thin’. And frankly, I’d rather they didn’t give a gust of stinking chihuahua flatulence whether the woman standing next to them has fleshier knees than they do. Let my girls be Hermiones, rather than Pansy Parkinsons.”
― J.K. Rowling

“There were different kinds of strength. I knew that now. It didn't always come from a knife or a willingness to fight. Sometimes it came from endurance, where the well ran deep and quiet. Sometimes it came from compassion and forgiveness.”
― Ann Aguirre, Enclave

“Listen to the mustn'ts, child. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn'ts, the impossibles, the won'ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me... Anything can happen, child. Anything can be.”
― Shel Silverstein

“Not all those who wander are lost.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

“Think, Believe, Dream, and Dare.”
― Walt Disney

“Age is foolish and forgetful when it underestimates youth.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

“Anything is possible. Anything can be.”
― Shel Silverstein

“If you are a dreamer come in”
― Shel Silverstein

“If there is a book you want to read but isn`t written yet,write it.”
― Shel Silverstein , Roger Was a Razor Fish, and Other Poems

“It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all—in which case, you fail by default.”
― J.K. Rowling

“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.”
― Neil Gaiman, Coraline

“I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.”
― Jorge Luis Borges

“Sometimes, you read a book and it fills you with this weird evangelical zeal, and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back together unless and until all living humans read the book.”
― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

“Books are a uniquely portable magic.”
― Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

“Reading was my escape and my comfort, my consolation, my stimulant of choice: reading for the pure pleasure of it, for the beautiful stillness that surrounds you when you hear an author's words reverberating in your head.”
― Paul Auster, The Brooklyn Follies

“She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Work: A Story of Experience

“…I’d have died without them [books]. Even now I’m not really sure which parts of myself are real and which parts are things I’ve gotten from books.”
― Beatrice Sparks, Go Ask Alice

“If my life is going to mean anything, I have to live it myself.”
― Rick Riordan, The Lightning Thief

“Libraries were full of ideas—perhaps the most dangerous and powerful of all weapons.”
― Sarah J. Maas, Throne of Glass

“You cannot pick and choose what parts of her to love.”
― Sarah J. Maas, Heir of Fire

“Because I am lost," she whispered onto the earth. "And I do not know the way.”
― Sarah J. Maas, Heir of Fire

“...her dearest friends are characters in books.”
― Sarah J. Maas, Heir of Fire

“All she knew was that whatever and whoever climbed out of that abyss of despair and grief would not be the same person who had plummeted in.”
― Sarah J. Maas, Heir of Fire

“The finest of pleasures are always the unexpected ones.”
― Erin Morgenstern, The Night Circus

“You may tell a tale that takes up residence in someone's soul, becomes their blood and self and purpose. That tale will move them and drive them and who knows that they might do because of it, because of your words. That is your role, your gift.”
― Erin Morgenstern, The Night Circus

“Life takes us to unexpected places sometimes. The future is never set in stone, remember that.”
― Erin Morgenstern, The Night Circus

“I have hated words and I have loved them, and I hope I have made them right.”
― Markus Zusak, The Book Thief

“I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.”
― Markus Zusak, The Book Thief

“She leaned down and looked at his lifeless face and Leisel kissed her best friend, Rudy Steiner, soft and true on his lips. He tasted dusty and sweet. He tasted like regret in the shadows of trees and in the glow of the anarchist's suit collection. She kissed him long and soft, and when she pulled herself away, she touched his mouth with her fingers...She did not say goodbye. She was incapable, and after a few more minutes at his side, she was able to tear herself from the ground. It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on...”
― Markus Zusak, The Book Thief

“The consequence of this is that I'm always finding humans at their best and worst. I see their ugly and their beauty, and I wonder how the same thing can be both. (Death)”
― Markus Zusak, The Book Thief