People Like Us Quotes

“There should be a word for the ability to stop crying about a past pain even though it's still in you. There should be a word for living.

Yes, that's it. There should be a word for continuing to live when a part of you has died. There should be a word that sums that up. And the longer you live, the more that word should become a part of you. Because the thing of it is, every day that the person is missed feels longer and there's nothing you can do about it. Nothing you can do to share the long, beautiful days which they are not a part of.”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us

“That whole thing about how something that doesn't kill you serves only to make you stronger is one of the biggest lies ever told. Sometimes a thing happens and it breaks you, makes you weaker, and there ain't no getting back to the way it was. Sometimes it's physical. Sometimes it's mental or
emotional.”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us

“Can't we just stay here? Now? In this time?"
     She's a child again. Years and years away from that gun.
     "No," she says. She's sixteen again. Dressed in that dress again. "You can't fix the world," she says. "You can't fix time. People like us, we feel it too much. We want to fix too much. And, sometimes, it just swallows us up."
     "People like us?" he says. He is in Minnesota. He is in Bolton. In France, in Italy, in Toronto. He is everywhere he's been and will be.
     "Of course. Why else do you think you're writing this?”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us

“Dylan leans in real slow. "I told you Europeans were different," he whispers.
     "No foolin'."
     The rest of the event goes about the same. The Italians come at me on after the other, leaving the softball questions at home. Nothing but the fastballs coming fast, hard, and inside. "How does your book fit into the neo-postmodern landscape?" one of them asks.
     Three rows back," I say, giving another patented chuckle.
     "Are you a Hegelian?" another asks.
     "Only with the ladies," I answer. Whoever said you have to know what a word means to be able to answer to it?”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us

“They brought us blankets and pillows and meals on those same silver platters they'd set before us when we ate in the dining room proper. And then, somewhere around the fifth day, we woke up in the library and found tables had been brought in and there was breakfast waiting for us and the middle of the room had been turned into a bedroom of sorts and so, when we woke up, we all saw it and just sorta smiled and sat and ate breakfast and talked about the books we'd read the day before and the books we were planning to read today and then we did just that.”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us

“I had a girlfriend once who would tell me thirty times a day—no foolin'!—that she loved me. Over and over and over again, all day long. And I'd say it back to her until I was dry in the mouth, even though I couldn't get my thinking around why she needed to say it so much. Then I figured it out: sometimes when someone says 'I love you' what they're really doing is asking 'Do you love me?' Now I probably say 'I love you' to America thirty times a day.”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us

“Book tours are all about repeatedly delivering your elevator pitch and, sister, I've got elevator experience. It's all about getting the most information across in the shortest time possible and nobody in the equation is supposed to really get down to the bare bones of things because, hell, nobody has time. And, normally, nobody reads the book.”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us

“Some words in this world you shouldn't say out loud no matter who you are. They're just too big. They hurt too many and reward too few. Words that should never roll off a civilized tongue. The N-word is one of them. And so, while I'm not one to say it—I've learned to be a little too classy for that and Sharon tells me that dropping that word can hurt book sales—I will break my own code and I'll say it here once, just to clarify that we're on the same page, and I promise I'll never say it again. No ma'am. Just the one time to clarify terms. Gird your emotional loins, my friend. Here we go. The N-word.
     National Book Award.
     Makes me shudder every time.
     Hope I didn't scare you off. From here on out I promise I'll use, as the Frenchies say, a name-de-plum for it. We'll just call it "The Big One".”
― Jason Mott, People Like Us