Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. This is my first Top 10 Tuesday post, and this week the theme is Favourite Book Quotes (these could be quotes from books you love, or bookish quotes in general).
I’m not one to make notes of quotes I like so this is going to be difficult. I will do my best to pick some good ones.
1) Record of a Spaceborn Few by Becky Chambers
“The only way to really appreciate your way is to compare it to somebody else’s way. Figure out what you love, specifically. In detail. Figure out what you want to keep. Figure out what you want to change. Otherwise, it’s not love. It’s clinging to the familiar–to the comfortable–and that’s a dangerous thing for us short-term thinkers to do. If you stay, stay because you want to, because you’ve found something here worth embodying, because you believe in it. Otherwise…well, there’s no point in being here at all, is there?”
2) The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab
“Because time is cruel to all, and crueler still to artists. Because visions weakens, and voices wither, and talent fades…. Because happiness is brief, and history is lasting, and in the end… everyone wants to be remembered”
3) Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor
“And that’s how you go on. You lay laughter over the dark parts. The more dark parts, the more you have to laugh. With defiance, with abandon, with hysteria, any way you can.”
4) Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor (again)
“Life won’t just happen to you boy, he said. You have to happen to it.”
5) The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern
“Be brave,’ she says. ‘Be bold. Be loud. Never change for anyone but yourself. Any soul worth their star-stuff will take the whole package as is and however it grows. Don’t waste your time on anyone who doesn’t believe you when you tell them how you feel.”
6) Fire by Kristin Cashore
“Brigan was saying her name, and he was sending her a feeling. It was courage and strength, and something else too, as if he were standing with her, as if he’d taken her within himself, letting her rest her entire body for a moment on his backbone, her mind in his mind, her heart in the fire of his.
The fire of Brigan’s heart was astounding. Fire understood, and almost could not believe, that the feeling he was sending her was love.”
6) The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang (there are definitely more sophisticated quotes in this book but this one made me laugh in a very dark book)
“Sir?” Kitay asked. The magistrate turned to look at him. “What?” With a grunt, Kitay raised the crate over his head and flung it to the ground. It landed on the dirt with a hard thud, not the tremendous crash Rin had rather been hoping for. The wooden lid of the crate popped off. Out rolled several very nice porcelain teapots, glazed with a lovely flower pattern. Despite their tumble, they looked unbroken. Then Kitay took to them with a slab of wood. When he was done smashing them, he pushed his wiry curls out of his face and whirled on the sweating magistrate, who cringed in his seat as if afraid Kitay might start smashing at him, too. “We are at war,” Kitay said. “And you are being evacuated because for gods know what reason, you’ve been deemed important to this country’s survival. So do your job. Reassure your people. Help us maintain order. Do not pack your fucking teapots.”
7) Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo
“Not every flower belongs in every garden.”
8) Radio Silence by Alice Oseman
“Every time I thought I’d worked out what I really enjoyed, I started to second-guess myself. Maybe I just didn’t enjoy anything anymore.”
9) Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
“Some people are born to make great art and others are born to appreciate it. Don’t you think? It is a kind of talent in itself, to be an audience, whether you are the spectator in the gallery or you are listening to the voice of the world’s greatest soprano. Not everyone can be the artist. There have to be those who witness the art, who love and appreciate what they have been privileged to see.”
10) The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn’t quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”
There we go. 10 of my favourite quotes. There are many, many more but I struggle to remember them. I am really looking forward to my re-read of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue because that book absolutely spoke to my soul.
Share with me some of your favourite quotes! Really interested, I love emotional quotes.
Toastie Books 