The Road Trip Quotes

“But that’s the thing about almost: you can be ninety-nine per cent there, you can be an inch away from doing it, but if you stop yourself from stepping over that line, nobody will ever know how close you were.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Everyone’s got the potential to do the wrong thing – if we were measured that way, we’d all come up short. It’s about what you do.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“He's not looking at me like he's never seen me before. He's looking at me like he's never seen anyone else.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Love as a bargain. Like, giving up your heart is scary, but doable if the other person does it at the exact same moment, like two soldiers lowering their weapons.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“To be true to yourself, you have to have a sense of self to work with.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Settle what down? What is there that needs settling? I know who I am and what I want. I don’t need some guy to make me complete, or whatever it is they’re meant to do.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“What’s shame good for, except keeping people down?”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Do you know what it says about you that you believed the word of a man you don’t know over the word of the woman you love?”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“If one could harness secrets for energy, we wouldn’t need petrol. We’d have enough grudges in this car to take us all the way to Scotland.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“know how fiercely I’d protest that consent is an ongoing process. That no means no whatever you’ve said before it. But then the clarity’s gone again. There’s just horror and shame.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“I keep pressing Esc but I’m still here”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“the hint of a wish of a chance”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Do you know what an achievement it is to turn out that way growing up in your house?” Marcus says to my father, straightening up. He meets my dad’s gaze like it’s no effort at all, like he isn’t even frightened. “Do you know what it takes to be a good man when someone’s always told you you’re not good enough?”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“If I really thought I wasn’t good enough, I’d stop writing. Deep down, I love what I write and I think other people might too, one day.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Darling, have you no shame? Cherry had said, What’s shame good for, except keeping people down?”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Twenty-five years,” Mum says, glancing over her shoulder with a smile. “And it’s all about compromise, I’d say.”

“Like how you always let Dad watch the telly after dinner and you tidy up?” I say, raising my eyebrows.

“Exactly. He cooks!”

“But you do all the thinking about what to make,” I point out. “And the shop.”

She frowns. “We each do our fair share.”

There is no point talking to my mother about mental load. For her, Dad is the ultimate modern man because he irons his own shirts.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Terry’s the “fun guy” of the boys you’d see at a pub quiz machine. The one who never gets laid but talks like he’s screwed every girl in the bar. That guy, but twenty years on. Still “fun,” still not getting any.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“No, the book had to go. I shan’t say I’ll never write another, but that book was never really about the summer of our lives. It was all about a man. And once I’d realized that, I simply couldn’t stand to look at it.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“We can’t be sorry forever. That’s what forgiveness is for, isn’t it?”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“We’re different, me and you. I’ll never break your heart, Addie.”

“And so said every gentleman to the girl who lived in the servant’s quarters, eh?”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“I think I’ve found something. Was Deb wearing white trainers?”

“Yeah? Maybe? I can’t remember”

“Because I’m in the river and I think I’ve found one of Deb’s shoes. It is possible she may have drowned?”

“What?”

“Well, in films, when you find someone’s shoe on a riverbank, it’s usually because they’re dead.”

“Maybe she just kicked them off and went for a dip to cool off.”

“Where’s the other shoe, then?”

On her corpse obviously, according to my overactive imagination.
“Send me picture of the shoe, maybe. I’m sure it’s fine, Rodney”

I look down at the photo Rodney sent over to me “Oh, for Christ’s sake.” I hit dial.

“Hello, Rodney speaking! How can I help?”

“What? Rodney, it’s Dylan. That shoe. It’s a man’s shoe. Obviously. What size does it say on the bottom?”

“Eleven. Oh! Does Deb have very big feet?”

“No, Rodney, she doesn’t.”

“Great! It’s someone else who must’ve drowned, then. I’ll get out of the river, in that case.”

“You’re… in the river? Actually in it”

“I’m trawling! For bodies! No need now though, if it isn’t Deb”

“Ok. Thanks, Rodney. Keep at it.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“I don't want him to know how completely he has me already.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Everyone’s got the potential to do the wrong thing—if we were measured that way, we’d all come up short. It’s about what you do.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“She is wild and clever, sharp and bright, always twisting out of my reach. She isn’t mine. I’m hers.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Lover. The word has made its way into the poems I’ve scrawled in my notebook after leaving her bed, and already it’s begun to shift, losing its languid R, fast becoming love.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“giving up your heart is scary, but doable if the other person does it at the exact same moment, like two soldiers lowering their weapons.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“I kiss Addie Gilbert for the second first time.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Gone is the idea that I ever stopped hoping she might love me again, because look, look how quickly it came back to me. It was never really gone.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“Well you might be all Dylan's, but he's not all yours.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip

“I like you Dylan. More than I ought to.”
― Beth O'Leary, The Road Trip