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Anna Is The Only Proof I Have That I Was Born Into This Family. Instead Of Dropped Off On The Doorstep By Some Bonnie And Clyde Couple That Ran Off Into The Night. On The Surface, We’re Polar Opposites. Under The Skin, Though, We’re The Same: People Think They Know What They’re Getting, And They’re Always Wrong. (jesse)

-Jodi Picoult

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Anna Is The Only

Jodi Picoult

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Anna Is The Only Proof I Have That I Was Born Into This Family. Instead Of Dropped Off On The Doorstep By Some Bonnie And Clyde Couple That Ran Off Into The Night. On The Surface, We’re Polar Opposites. Under The Skin, Though, We’re The Same: People Think They Know What They’re Getting, And They’re Always Wrong. (jesse)

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But Rules Only Work When Everyone Plays By Them. What Happens When Someone Doesn't, And The Fallout Bleeds Right Into His Life? Whats Stronger- The Need To Uphold The Law, Or The Motive To Turn One's Back On It?

There Was No Easy Switch That She Could Flip To Stem The Flow Of Feelings, No Way To Drain The Memories That Pooled Like Acid In Her Stomach Because Her Heart No Longer Knew What To Do With Them.

Was There A Language Of Loss? Did Everyone Who Suffered Speak A Different Dialect?

As It Turned Out, Though, It Was A Lot Easier To Say That Someone Deserved To Die For What They Did Than It Was To Take The Responsibility To Make That Happen.

Life, It Turns Out, Goes On. There Is No Cosmic Rule That Grants You Immunity From The Details Just Because You Have Come Face-to-face With A Catastrophe. The Garbage Can Still Overflow, The Bills Arrive In The Mail, Telemarketers, Interrupt Dinner.

Can You Hate Someone For What They Have Done, But Still Love Them For Whom They Had Been?

Sometimes When You Pick Up Your Child You Can Feel The Map Of Your Own Bones Beneath Your Hands, Or Smell The Scent Of Your Skin In The Nape Of His Neck. This Is The Most Extraordinary Thing About Motherhood - Finding A Piece Of Yourself Separate And Apart That All The Same You Could Not Live Without.

Technically I've Improved - I Might Turn A Metaphor In Five Words Now, Where Years Ago, It Would Have Taken Me A Paragraph. I Can't Say It Was Intentional - But You Know What They Say About Practice Making Perfect...!

No One Ever Asks A Kid For Her Opinion, But It Seems To Me That Growing Up Means You Stop Hoping For The Best, And Start Expecting The Worst.

In This New Place We've Found, Sometimes There Aren't Words, Because The Truth Can Be Even More Difficult Than The Lies.

Normal, In Our House, Is Like A Blanket Too Short For A Bed--sometimes It Covers You Just Fine, And Other Times It Leaves You Cold And Shaking; And Worst Of All, You Never Know Which Of The Two It's Going To Be.

It Is A Remarkable Question- Do All The Wonderful Things Happen When We Are Not Aware Of Them?

She Suddenly Remembered Studying The Brain In Science Class- How A Steel Rod Pierced A Man's Skull, And He Opened His Mouth To Speak Portuguese, A Language He'd Never Studied. Maybe It Would Be Like This, Now, For Josie. Maybe Her Native Tongue, From Here On In, Would Be A String Of Lies.

The Weapons An Author Has At Her Disposal Are Flawed. There Are Words That Feel Shapeless And Overused. Love, For Example. I Could Write The Word Love A Thousand Times And It Would Mean A Thousand Different Things To Different Readers.

I Once Heard Someone On A Bus Say That This Guy Had Gotten Under Her Skin. And It Struck Me As A Remarkable Thought - That Someone Would Affect You So Deeply They'd Always Be A Part Of You.

Listen, I Would Say, This Is Not How I Thought Our Lives Would Go; And May Be We Cannot Find Our Way Out Of This Alley. But There Is No One I'd Rather Be Lost With.

Sometimes The Key To Happiness Is Just Expecting A Little Bit Less

I Know What It's Like To Start Something And Have It Suddenly Grow Out Of Control. And You Want To Get Rid Of It, Because It's Hurting You And Everyone Else Around You, But Every Time You Try To Do That, It Consumes You Again.

I Have A Sister, So I Know-that Relationship, It's All About Fairness: You Want Your Sibling To Have Exactly What You Have-the Same Amount Of Toys, The Same Number Of Meatballs On Your Spaghetti, The Same Share Of Love. But Being A Mother Is Completely Different. You Want Your Child To Have More Than You Ever Did. You Want To Build A Fire Underneath Her And Watch Her Soar. It's Bigger Than Words.

I Was Starting To See That What Looks Like Garbage From One Angle Might Be Art From Another. Maybe It Did Take A Crisis To Get To Know Yourself; Maybe You Needed To Get Whacked Hard By Life Before You Understood What You Wanted Out Of It.

If You Choose To Be Looking For Something, You'd Better Be Ready For Whatever It Is You Are Find. Because It May Not Be What You've Been Expecting.

There Are All Sorts Of Losses People Suffer - From The Small To The Large. You Can Lose Your Keys, Your Glasses, Your Virginity. You Can Lose Your Head, You Can Lose Your Heart, You Can Lose Your Mind. You Can Relinquish Your Home To Move Into Assisted Living, Or Have A Child Move Overseas, Or See A Spouse Vanish Into Dementia. Loss Is More Than Just Death, And Grief Is The Gray Shape-shifter Of Emotion.

He Is Dark And Quiet And Completely Different From Me, Which Is Exactly Why I Should Put Distance Between Us. But It Is Also The Reason I Find Him So Fascinating.

Writing Is Grunt Work - You Need To Have Self-motivation, Perseverance, And Faith... Talent Is The Smallest Part Of It.

Nowadays, I Dont Have Expectations, And This Way She Beats Them All.

The Best Way To Prevent A Heartache Was To Cushion The Coming Blow.

An Item That Looks Perfectly Normal On The Surface Might Only Be Disguised.

Perfectly Normal

You Don't Love Someone Because They're Perfect, You Love Them In Spite Of The Fact That They're Not.

Logical Thinking Keeps You From Wasting Time Worrying, Or Hoping. It Prevents Disappointment. Imagination, On The Other Hand, Only Gets You Hyped Up Over Things That Will Never Realistically Happen.

She's Not Like Anyone I've Ever Seen Before. When I'm Not With Her, I Want To Be. And When She Opens The Book And I See Her Face, I Can Barely Remember What I'm Supposed To Say, Much Less How To Speak At All." I Test The Words On My Tongue. "i Think I Might Be In Love With Her. But How Can I Really Know, Since The Only Love I've Ever Experienced Was Written For Me?

I Don't Believe In Writer's Block. Most Of Writer's Block Is Having Too Much Time On Your Hands. My Mantra Is That You Can Always Edit A Bad Page; You Can't Edit A Blank Page.

A Lie, As You Probably Know, Has A Taste All Its Own. Blocky And Bitter And Never Quite Right.

Chicken,' Josie Said. 'have You Ever Been In Love?' Peter Looked At Josie, And Thought Of How They Had Once Tied A Note With Their Addresses To A Helium Balloon And Let It Go In Her Backyard, Certain It Would Reach Mars. Instead, They Had Received A Letter From A Widow Who Lived Two Blocks Away. 'yeah,' He Said. 'i Think So.

Justification Is A Remarkable Thing-takes All Those Solid Lines And Blurs Them, So That Honor Becomes As Supple As A Willow, And Ethics Burst Like Soap Bubbles.

The Woman Who Opens The Door Has A Blue Stain On Her Shirt And Dark Hair Wound Into A Messy Knot And The Most Beautiful Eyes I Have Ever Seen. They're Pale, Like A Lioness's, Nearly Golden, But They Also Look Like They've Done Their Fair Share Of Crying, And We All Know That A Sky With Clouds In It Is Much More Interesting Than One That Doesn't Have Any.

The More You Get Past Pain, The More It Goes From Coal To Diamond.

I Have Always Envied People Who Believe Strongly In Religion, People Who Could Face A Tragedy By Praying And Know That It Would Be All Right. As Unscientific As It Seems, Well, It Would Be Nice To Lay The Responsibilities And Pain On Someone Else's Larger Shoulders.

Violence Up Close Has A Smell. Like Copper Blood And Charcoal Burning.

Why Is It That Only In The Very Beginnings Of A Relationship Are You Aware Of The Heat Coming From Inside A Person, Of The Number Of Inches You Would Have To Move For Your Shoulders To Brush As If It Were An Accident?

Marina Sighs. "love's A Tidal Wave," She Says. "because It Sweeps You Off Your Feet?" I Ask. "no. Because It Sucks You Under And You Drown.

Parenting Is Really Just A Matter Of Tracking, Of Hoping Your Kids Do Not Get So Far Ahead You Can No Longer See Their Next Moves.

You Always Knew After Shitty Things Happened, Who Your Friends Really Were.

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There's Something Nice About Knowing That I'm Not The Only One Who Doesn't Quite Fit The Part.

Since It Had Gotten So Quiet In The Room That You Could Hear The Sound Of Your Own Doubts.

When You Are Attracted To People, It's Because Of The Details. Their Kindness. Their Eyes. The Fact That They Can Get You To Laugh When You Need It The Most.

The Question I Hate The Most Is "how Did You Do It - Write Novels And Raise Your Children Simultaneously!" I Mean, Do Male Authors Get Asked That??

Superheroes Were Born In The Minds Of People Desperate To Be Rescued.

You Can't Hate Someone Until You Know What It Might Be Like To Love Them.

It Turns Out That Sharing The Past With Someone Is Different From Reliving It When You’re Alone. It Feels Less Like A Wound, More Like A Poultice.

Fiction Comes In All Shapes And Sizes. Secrets,lies,stories. We All Tell Them. Sometimes,because We Hope To Entertain. Sometimes,because We Need To Distract. And Sometimes, Because We Have To.

We Could All Be Lucky. We Could All Be What We Want To Be, Instead Of Who Someone Else Told Us To Be.

Tutoring A Four Year Old To Get Into An Exclusive Preschool Made As Much Sense As Hiring A Swim Coach For A Guppy.

Life Sometimes Gets So Bogged Down In The Details, You Forget You Are Living It. There Is Always Another Appointment To Be Met, Another Bill To Pay, Another Symptom Presenting, Another Uneventful Day To Be Notched Onto The Wooden Wall. We Have Synchronized Our Watches, Studied Our Calendars, Existed In Minutes, And Completely Forgotten To Step Back And See What We've Accomplished.

You Know Someone's Right For You When The Things They Don't Have To Say Are Even More Important Than The Things They Do.

What’s The Difference Between Spending Your Life Trying To Be Invisible, Or Pretending To Be The Person You Think Everyone Wants You To Be? Either Way, You’re Faking.

I Used To Think I'd Be Just Like Them When I Grew Up, But I Am Not. And The Thing Is, Somewhere Along The Way, I Stopped Wanting To Be Like Them, Anyway.

Isn’t That What True Romance Is Supposed To Be About? Finding The Person Who’s Your Soul Mate. Someone You Dream About At Night.someone Whose Name Is On Your Lips When You Wake Up In The Morning.

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A Sacrament--like Marriage--means Living A Life Better Than Your Natural Instincts, So That You're Modeling God. And God Never Gives Up.

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I Felt A Splinter Of Guilt Wedge Into My Heart. Charlotte Had Hurt Me; In Return, I'd Hurt Rob. Maybe That's What We Do To The People We Love: Take Shots In The Dark And Realize Too Late We've Wounded The People We're Trying To Protect.

Memories Are Like A Still Life Painted By Ten Different Student Artists: Some Will Be Blue-based; Others Red; Some Will Be As Stark As Picasso And Others As Rich As Rembrandt; Some Will Be Foreshortened And Others Distant. Recollections Are In The Eye Of The Beholder; No Two Held Up Side By Side Will Ever Quite Match.

This Was Something She Would Keep Hidden Within Herself, Maybe In Place Of The Knot Of Pain And Anger She Had Been Carrying Under Her Breastbone...a Security Blanket, An Ace Up Her Sleeve. She Might Never Use It, But She Would Always Feel Its Presence Like A Swelling Secret Stone, And That Way When She Let Go Of The Rage, She Would Not Feel Nearly As Empty.

There Are Stars In The Night Sky That Look Brighter Than The Others, And When You Look At Them Through A Telescope You Realize You Are Looking At Twins. The Two Stars Rotate Around Each Other, Sometimes Taking Nearly A Hundred Years To Do It. They Create So Much Gravitational Pull There's No Room Around For Anything Else. You Might See A Blue Star, For Example, And Realize Only Later That It Has A White Dwarf As A Companion - That First One Shines So Bright, By The Time You Notice The Second One, It's Too Late.

But Then Again, Maybe Bad Things Happen Because It’s The Only Way We Can Keep Remembering What Good Is Supposed To Look Like.

I Wondered Why The Head Could Move So Swiftly While The Heart Dragged Its Feet.

There Had Been So Many Easy Words Between Them That Daniel Was Guilty Of Nodding Every Now And Then And Tuning Out The Excess. He Hadn't Known, At The Time, That He Should Have Been Hoarding These, Like Bits Of Sea Glass Hidden In The Pocket Of A Winter Coat To Remind Him That Once It Had Been Summer.

You Want To Write Something As Good As What You've Read.

It Was No Coincidence, That Fear Could Move A Person To Extremes, Just As Seamlessly As Love. They Were The Conjoined Twins Of Emotion: If You Didn't Know What Was At Stake To Lose, You Had Nothing To Fight For.

It Never Failed To Amaze Me How The Most Ordinary Day Could Be Catapulted Into The Extraordinary In The Blink Of An Eye.

Is It Really Worth Dying For The Person You Love?

When Heaven Breaks, Who Fixes It?

I Don't Believe In Writer's Block. Think About It - When You Were Blocked In College And Had To Write A Paper, Didn't It Always Manage To Fix Itself The Night Before The Paper Was Due? Writer's Block Is Having Too Much Time On Your Hands.

Some People Don't Know What To Do With An Act Of Kindness.

Doing The Right Thing For Someone Else Occasionally Means Doing Something That Feels Wrong To You.

I Realize How Quickly Lies Compound. They Cover Like A Coat Of Paint, One On Top Of The Other, Until You Cannot Remember What Color You Started With.

I Don't Have To Live The Lives Of My Characters To Write About Them. It's About Really Putting Yourself In Their Shoes.

Sometimes Chris Wished He Could Sneak A Peek At The Back Of The Book, So To Speak, And See How It Was All Going To Turn Out, So That He Wouldn't Have To Bother Going Through The Motions.

He Knew That There Was A Difference Between Something That Makes You Happy And Something That Doesn’t Make You Unhappy. The Trick Was Convincing Yourself These Were One And The Same.

Convincing Yourself

When The News You Don't Want To Hear Is Looming Before You Like Everest, Two Things Can Happen. Tragedy Can Run You Through Like A Sword, Or It Can Become Your Backbone. Either You Fall Apart And Sob, Or You Say, 'right. What's Next?

He Smiles At Me, And I Am Suddenly Seventeen Again - The Year I Realize That Love Doesn't Follow The Rules, The Year I Understood That Nothing Is Worth Having So Much As Something Unattainable

Maybe You Had To Leave In Order To Really Miss A Place; Maybe You Had To Travel To Figure Out How Beloved Your Starting Point Was.

Peter Was, Simply, What A Person Would Look Like If You Boiled Down The Most Raw Emotions And Filtered Them Of Any Social Contract. If You Hurt, Cry. If You Rage, Strike Out. If You Hope, Get Ready For A Disappointment.

Do You Know How Sometimes - When You Are Riding Your Bike And You Start Skidding Across Sand, Or When You Miss A Step And Start Tumbling Down The Stairs - You Have Those Long, Long Seconds To Know That You Are Going To Be Hurt, And Badly?

Riding Your Bike

What Is The Point Of Trying To Put Down On Paper Emotions That Are Too Complex, Too Huge, Too Overwhelming To Be Confined By An Alphabet? Love Isn't The Only Word That Fails. Hate Does, Too.

Real Mothers Don't Just Listen With Humble Embarrassment To The Elderly Lady Who Offers Unsolicited Advice In The Checkout Line When A Child Is Throwing A Tantrum. We Take The Child, Dump Him In The Lady's Cart, And Say, "great. Maybe You Can Do A Better Job." Real Mothers Know That It's Okay To Eat Cold Pizza For Breakfast. Real Mothers Admit It Is Easier To Fail At This Job Than To Succeed.

When You Are A Kid You Have Your Own Language, And Unlike French Or Spanish Or Whatever You Start Learning In Fourth Grade, This One You Are Born With, And Eventually Lose...kids Think With Their Brains Cracked Wide Open; Becoming An Adult...is Only A Slow Sewing It Shut.

You Know How I Get Angry Sometimes? That's Because It's The Only Way I Can Still Feel. And I Need To Test Myself, To Make Sure I'm Really Here.

What Makes You Walk Past Thirty-thousand People Without A Second Glance, And Then You Look At The Thirty-thousandth-and-first Person And Know You'll Never Take Your Eyes Off Her Again?

Life Can Change In An Instant; Don't Be So Worried About The Future That You Forget To Celebrate What You Have Right Now.

I Don't Believe In God. But Sitting There, In A Room Full Of Those Who Feel Otherwise, I Realize That I Do Believe In People. In Their Strength To Help Each Other, And To Thrive In Spite Of The Odds, I Believe That The Extraordinary Trumps The Ordinary, Any Day. I Believe That Having Something To Hope For -- Even If It's Just A Better Tomorrow -- Is The Most Powerful Drug On This Planet.

I Wondered About The Explorers Who'd Sailed Their Ships To The End Of The World. How Terrified They Must Have Been When They Risked Falling Over The Edge; How Amazed To Discover, Instead, Places They Had Seen Only In Their Dreams.

Hope And Reality Lie In Inverse Proportions.

So Much Of Marriage Was Implicit And Nonverbal. Had I Gotten So Complacent I'd Forgotten To Communicate?

Everyone Has A Story; Everyone Hides His Past As A Means Of Self-preservation. Some Just Do It Better, And More Thoroughly, Than Others.

The Way I See It, Love Is Just A Bigger, Stickier Form Of Trust.

I'm Always Writing, Even When I'm Not At My Desk. I Write On My Hands. I Used To Write On My Kids' Hands, Too, But They Don't Let Me Any More. When I'm Driving I Sometimes Write All The Way Up My Arms.

Mistakes Are Something That Happen By Accident. You Didn't Walk Out The Door One Morning And Fall Into Some Guy's Bed. You Thought About It, For A While. You Made That Choice.

We'd Sit With A Big Bowl Of Popcorn, Wrapped Together In A Queen-size Blanket, And Would Escape To A Place Where Magic Was Ours For The Taking, Where Men Rescued The People They Loved Instead Of Abandoning Them. A Place Where, No Matter How Bad Things Looked At That Moment, There Would Always Be A Happy Ending.

Anna Is The Only Proof I Have That I Was Born Into This Family. Instead Of Dropped Off On The Doorstep By Some Bonnie And Clyde Couple That Ran Off Into The Night. On The Surface, We’re Polar Opposites. Under The Skin, Though, We’re The Same: People Think They Know What They’re Getting, And They’re Always Wrong. (jesse)

In The Custom Of Mourning, The Fabric Of The Night Had Been Ripped, Revealing A Star At Each Tiny Tear.

Once, I Asked My Mom Why Stars Shine. She Said They Were Night-lights, So The Angels Could Find Their Way Around In Heaven. But When I Asked My Dad, He Started Talking About Gas, And Somehow I Put It All Together And Figured That The Food God Served Caused Multiple Trips To The Bathroom In The Middle Of The Night.

What's Stronger-the Need To Uphold The Law, Or The Motive To Turn One's Back On It?

We Have Been Naive Enough To Believe That We Were Invincible; That We Could Run Blind Through The Hairpin Turns Of Life At Treacherous Speeds And Never Crash.

I Have Never Fit Into This Town, This Marriage, This Skin. I Am The Child Who Was Picked Last To Play Tag; I Am The Girl Who Laughed Although She Did Not Get The Joke; I Am The Piecemeal Part Of You That You Pretend Doesn't Exist, Except It Is All I Am, All The Time.

The Only Person Who Suffers, When You Squirrel Alway All That Hate, Is You.

There Was, Really, Nothing You Could Use As A Blueprint For Your Life, Except Your Past. There Was No Starting Over. There Was Only Picking Up The Pieces Someone Had Left Behind.

...when They Look At Me, I So Badly Want To Be Who They See.

They're Fake Bullets, So Why Do I Feel Like Im Bleeding Out?

How Could You Go About Choosing Something That Would Hold The Half Of Your Heart You Had To Bury?

I’d Much Rather Pretend I’m Somewhere Else, And Any Time I Open The Pages Of A Book, That Happens.

I Could Think Whatever I Wanted To, But Realized That Any Promises I Made Myself Were Destined To Be Broken.

My Whole Life Was About Her, What If Her Whole Life Wasn’t All About Me?

May I Ask You Something?" I Say. "why Do You Read Books, When You Could Be Outside, Living A Million Different Adventures Every Day?" "because You Can Always Count On A Book To Stay The Same. Everything Else Changes When You Least Expect It," She Replies, Bitter. "families Split Apart, And Nothing's Forever. In Books, You Always Know What's Coming Next. There Are No Surprises.

People Have To Experience Things That Terrify Them. If They Don't, How Will They Ever Come To Appreciate Safety?

My Brother Believed In All Sorts Of Mythical Creatures: Pixies, Dragons, Werewolves, Honest Men.

I Know What Love Is. When You Find The Person You Are Supposed To Love, Bells Ring And Fireworks Go Off In Your Head And You Can't Find The Words To Speak And You Think About Him All The Time. When You Find The Person You Are Supposed To Love, You Will Know By Staring Deeply Into Their Eyes.

I Imagine The Touch Of Someone Who Loves You So Much, He Cannot Bear To Watch You Sleep; And So You Wake Up With His Hand On Your Heart.

Why Are You Doing This To Yourself? When Something Bad Happens, Why Do You Have To Pick At It Until It Bleeds All Over Again?

I Didn't Want To See Her Because It Would Make Me Feel Better. I Came Because Without Her, It's Hard To Remember Who I Am.

I Am Not Keeping My Distance Because It Is Uncomfortable For Me, But Because It Is Uncomfortable For Them.

Most People In America Want An Easy Read. I Call It Mcfiction - Books Which Pass Right Through You Without You Even Digesting Them. I Don't Mean A Book That Has Two-syllable Words. I Mean Chapters You Can Read In A Toilet Break. Happy Endings. We Are More Of A Tv Culture.

When I Was Little, The Great Mystery To Me Was Not How Babies Were Made, But Why?

Dylan Jerome," The Lawyer Admits, "wanted To Sue God For Not Caring Enough About Him.

For Better Or For Worse, Music Is The Language Of Memory. It Is Also The Language Of Love.

Language Of Love

A Public Persona That Might Be Different From What We Truly Feel Inside... Everyone Wonders If They Are Good Enough, Smart Enough, Pretty Enough, No Matter How Old They Are. It Is An Archetypical Moral Dilemma - Do You Act Like Yourself And Risk Becoming An Outcast?

You Can't Be Real," Delilah Murmurs. "says Who?" I Ask. "did You Really Think That A Story Exists Only When You're Reading It?

Stem Cell Research Has Become Such A Polarizing Issue In America... And I Wanted To Bring It Down To The Personal Level, Instead Of The Political.

How Could You Beat An Enemy You Couldn't See?

There Is A Fine Line Between Seeing Something That's Lost As Missing, And Seeing It As Something That Might Be Found.

The Problem With You Is That You Always See A Glass Of Milk Half Empty Instead Of Half Filled.

I Think Her Flaws Make Me Love Her Even More. She's Not Perfect, But She's Perfect To Me

I Thought Lightning Wasn't Supposed To Strike In The Same Place Twice....sure It Does...but Only If You're Too Dumb To Move.

Loneliness Is A Mirror, And Recognizes Itself.

You Can Love A Person And Still Hate The Decisions They've Made, Can't You?

Sometimes To Get What You Want The Most, You Have To Do What You Want The Least.

My Sisters Keeper

To Me, A Good Event Is Governed By The Audience.

How Could You Not Want To Draw Breath One More Day? How Could Your Own Life Be Such A Cheap Commodity? But Then I Started To Understand: When Your Existence Is Hell, Death Must Be Heaven.

When Someone Loves You Up One Side And Down The Other Like That, You Make Every Effort To Stick Around.

On My License, It Says I'm An Organ Donor, But The Truth Is I'd Consider Being An Organ Martyr. I'm Sure I'm Worth A Lot More Dead Than Alive - The Sum Of The Parts Equal More Than The Whole. I Wonder Who Might Wind Up Walking Around With My Liver, My Lungs, Even My Eyeballs. I Wonder What Poor Asshole Would Get Stuck With Whatever It Is In Me That Passes For A Heart.

Close A Door, And You'd Still Feel A Breeze Through The Window.

In The Space Between Yes And No, There's A Lifetime. It's The Difference Between The Path You Walk And The One You Leave Behind; It's The Gap Between Who You Thought You Could Be And Who You Really Are; Its The Legroom For The Lies You'll Tell Yourself In The Future.

You Live And Let Live, Eventually That Becomes Enough.

Live And Let Live

I Think Once You Sign On To Be A Mother, That's The Only Shift They Offer.

And If Your Parents Have You For A Reason, Then That Reason Better Exist. Because Once It's Gone, So Are You.

Fiction Allows For Moral Questioning, But Through The Back Door. Personally, I Like Books That Make You Think - Books You're Still Wondering About Three Days After You Finish Them; Books You Hand To A Friend And Say "read This, So We Can Talk About It."

If Words Had Flavors, Hers Would Be Bitter Almonds And Coffee Grounds.

She Stared At Peter, And She Realized That In That One Moment, When She Hadn't Been Thinking, She Knew Exactly What He'd Felt As He Moved Through The School With His Backpack And His Guns. Every Kid In This School Played A Role: Jock, Brain, Beauty, Freak. All Peter Had Done Was What They All Secretly Dreamed Of: Be Someone, Even For Just Nineteen Minutes, Who Nobody Else Was Allowed To Judge.

You Can Make It Dark, But I Can't Make It Light.

The Real Power Of A Wolf Isn't In Its Fearsome Jaws, Which Can Clench With Fifteen Hundred Pounds Of Pressure Per Square Inch. The Real Power Of A Wolf Is Having That Strength, And Knowing When Not To Use It.

Religion Was Supposed To Be A Blanket Drawn Up To Your Chin To Keep You Warm, A Promise That When It Came To The End, You Wouldn't Die Alone - But It Could Just As Easily Leave You Shivering Out In The Cold, If What You Believed Became More Important Than The Fact That You Believed.

This Is What It Always Comes Down To, I Realized. There Are The Ones Who Believe, And The Ones Who Don't, And Caught In The Space Between Them Are Guns.

Just So You Know, When They Say "once Upon A Time” . . . They’re Lying

Once Upon A Time

Between The Lines

Life Isn't Nearly As Stable As We Want It To Be.

My Sisters Keeper

Being A Teenager Isn't All That Different From Being Part Of Someone Else's Story. There's Always Someone Who Thinks They Know Better Than You Do

And I Think, Not For The First Time, That What Is Immoral Is Not Always Wrong.

Inside Each Of Us Is A Monster; Inside Each Of Us Is A Saint. The Real Question Is Which One We Nurture The Most, Which One Will Smite The Other.

What If The One I Choose To Discount Is One Who Has Been Truly Hurt?

But Sometimes, In Order To Win, You Have To Make Sacrifices.

I Knew That Somewhere God Was Laughing. He Had Taken The Other Half Of My Heart, The One Person Who Knew Me Better Than I Knew Myself, And He Had Done What Nothing Else Could Do. By Bringing Us Together, He Had Set Into Motion The One Thing That Could Tear Us Apart.

He Began To Trace A Pattern On The Table With The Nail Of His Thumb. "she Kept Saying She Wanted To Keep Things Exactly The Way They Were, And That She Wished She Could Stop Everything From Changing. She Got Really Nervous, Like, Talking About The Future. She Once Told Me That She Could See Herself Now, And She Could Also See The Kind Of Life She Wanted To Have - Kids, Husband, Suburbs, You Know - But She Couldn't Figure Out How To Get From Point A To Point B.

The Human Capacity For Burden Is Like Bamboo- Far More Flexible Than You'd Ever Believe At First Glance.

Listen,” She Said. “i May Not Be What You Want Right Now, But I’m All You’ve Got.

Eskimos Maybe? Believed Stars Were Holes In The Sky Where People Who Died Could Peek Through At You

Memory Is Like Plaster: Peel It Back And You Just Might Find A Completely Different Picture.

You Would Wind Up As A Cat, I Told Her. They Don't Need Anyone Else. I Need You, She Replied. Well, I Said. Maybe I'll Come Back As Catnip.

I Think You're The Only Person Who Gets Me. When I'm With You, The World Doesn't Feel Like A Problem I Can't Figure Out. Please Come To The Dance, Because You're My Music.

When A Freedom Is Taken Away From You, I Suppose, You Recognize It As A Privilege, Not A Right.

I Think Many Of My Books, Including "handle With Care," Including "my Sister's Keeper" Circle Back To How Far Are We Willing To Go For The People We Love? I Think Love Changes The Way We Think. It's The Thing That Takes You Out Of What Your Normal Set Of Beliefs Would Be.

Sometimes We Find Ourselves Walking Through Life Blindfolded, And We Try To Deny That We're The Ones Who Securely Tied The Knot.

Walking Through Life

You Didn't Get Past Something Like That, You Go Through It -- And For That Reason Alone, I Understood More About Her Than She Ever Would Have Guessed.

Writing Is Total Grunt Work. A Lot Of People Think It's All About Sitting And Waiting For The Muse. I Don't Buy That. It's A Job. There Are Days When I Really Want To Write, Days When I Don't. Every Day I Sit Down And Write.

I Would Have Given Anything To Keep Her Little. They Outgrow Us So Much Faster Than We Outgrow Them. Brian Fitzgerald, Talking About His Children.

You Need To Learn To Write On Demand, And To Get Critiqued Without Flinching. When Someone Can Rip Your Work To Shreds Without It Feeling As Though Your Arm Has Been Hacked Off, You're Ready To Send Your Novel Off To An Agent.

Infatuation's Just Another Word For Not Seeing Clearly. When You Start To Love A Person- That's When They Become Real

I Never Said I Do Not Remember, My Grandmother Corrects. I Said I Prefer To Forget.

There Are Some Things We Do Because We Convince Ourselves It Would Be Better For Everyone Involved. We Tell Ourselves That It's The Right Thing To Do, The Altruistic Thing To Do. It's Far Easier Than Telling Ourselves The Truth.

My Sisters Keeper

Being A Parent Wasn't Just About Bearing A Child. It Was About Bearing Witness To Its Life.

I Think There Are Crossroads In Our Lives When We Make Grand, Sweeping Decisions Without Even Realizing It.

Sometimes I Think There's A Beast That Lives Inside Me, In The Cavern That's Where My Heart Should Be, And Every Now And Then It Fills Every Last Inch Of My Skin, So That I Can't Help But Do Something Inappropriate. Its Breath Is Full Of Lies; It Smells Of Spite.

I Had Absolutely No Trauma In My Childhood. If Anyone Ever Assumed That My Books Were Autobiographical, They'd Be Sorely Disappointed, Because None Of These Things Happened To Me.

Everyone Knew That If You Divided Reality By Expectation, You Got A Happiness Quotient. But When You Invert The Equation - Expectation Divided By Reality - You Didn't Get The Opposite Of Happiness. What You Got, Lewis Realized, Was Hope.

I Wanted Him To Feel What I Felt When I Was With Him: That Incredible Combination Of Comfort, Decadence, And Wonder; The Knowledge That, With Just A Single Taste Of Him, I Was Addicted.

There Is A Gulf As Wide As An Ocean Between Should And Want, And I Am Drowning In It.

All I Know Is That I Carried You For Nine Months. I Fed You, I Clothed You, I Paid For Your College Education. Friending Me On Facebook Seems Like A Small Thing To Ask In Return.

Mother Daughter

Mother And Daughter

Mom And Daughter

I Have Only Known Her For Two Years. But If You Took Every Memory, Every Moment, If You Stretched Them End To End-they'd Reach Forever.

Forgiveness Is Spiritual. Punishment Is Legal," Leo Says. "they're Not Mutually Exclusive.

They Don't Really Pay Attention To Me, Except When They Need My Blood Or Something. I Wouldn't Even Be Alive, If It Wasn't For Kate Being Sick.

I Imagine Having That Sixth Sense, The Certainty That What I'm Looking For Is Within Reach, Even If It's Still Hidden.

When You're A Parent You Find Yourself Looking At The Unknown That Is Your Child, Trying To Find A Piece Of Yourself Inside Her, Because Sometimes That Is What It Takes To Claim.

Finding Yourself

Every Year I Tell Myself That I’m Not Going To Read Any Reviews And Then I Do. We’re All Human And When I Read Something Negative It Hurts. I Think When You Write It’s Part Of The Game, You’re Going To Get Some Good Reviews And Some Bad Reviews And That’s How It Goes. I Don’t Write For The Reviews.

What Does It Feel Like?” He Asked. “what Does What Feel Like?” Peter Thought For A Moment. “being At The Top.” Josie Reached Across Him For Another Packet Of Material And Fed It Into The Stapler. She Did Three Of These, And Peter Was Certain That She Was Going To Ignore Him, But Then She Spoke. “like If You Take One Wrong Step,” She Said, “you’re Going To Fall.

The Truth Doesn't Always Set You Free; People Prefer To Believe Prettier, Neatley Wrapped Lies

Here's What No One Ever Tells You About Love: It Hurts, Having Your Heart Broken

The Cost Of Growth Is Always A Small Act Of Violence.

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