Quotes from Cynthia Lord

Giving up and letting go are two very different things. Giving up is admitting you're beat and walking away. Letting go means you're setting something free. You're releasing something that's been keeping you stuck. That takes faith and more than a little courage.

As we continued upward, I thought about how adults sometimes complain that kids only think about ourselves, but it's not true. We care a lot about other people, but most times, we don't have the power to change things for them.

Looking at the poster, I thought, Maybe we can't solve every big problem, but we can try to solve the ones we can.

Even half a chance beats none.

Some people think they know who you are, when really they don't.

If you say something over and over and over, maybe they'll give in to shut you up.

If you want to get away with something, don't announce it first.

But that's the one thing about being blind. What you look like doesn't matter to Lucky. He sees you with his heart" -Lily

I wasn't sure if we'd ever be the same kind of friends we'd been when we were little. Maybe being two peas in a pod was over, but maybe we could be more like two wild blueberries: two of a kind, but different, too." -Lily

New friendships break pretty easily if something goes wrong at the beginning.

One thing I'd learned about moving was that once you were there, it was better to just look ahead. Because even if you went back to visit the places and people you left behind, it was never the same — except in photos.

No toys in the fish tank." I

world as it is to show the beautiful ones.

Mom says I have to deal with what is and not to get my hopes up, but how else can hopes go but up?

Dogs always forgive you when they know you're sorry. And so do star friends" -Lily

Low tide smells mud-black and tangy, but high tide smells clean and salty.

At the beginning of summer it always feels like there's so much time ahead: whole empty calendar pages of sunshine, warm sea breezes, midnight thunderstorms, and running barefoot in the grass. Enough afternoons to do every single thing you wanted to do and even some days left over to do nothing at all. But somehow summer fills up and flies by" -Lily

I think art can take ordinary things and show them to you like it's the first time you've ever seen them. And you realize that even ordinary things aren't really ordinary at all" -Salma

Someday soon," he says. "I promise.

Leaving out isn't the same as lying.

Sometimes life is like a long road leading from one "if" to another.

Oh, people will think what they think!" Grandma Lilah said. "Don't ever choose the people who don't matter over the ones who do.

Good-bye isn't the worst thing in the world. Sometimes it's simply time to go.

Just because other people think something, that doesn't make it true.