Quotes from Rodman Philbrick

You could hear a mouse fart.

Things never look better in the morning. How could they, when nothing ever changes?

You don't need a time machine if you know how to remember.

We're Freak the Mighty, that's who we are. We're nine feet tall, in case you haven't noticed." That's how it started, really, how we got to be Freak the Mighty, slaying dragons and fools and walking high above the world.

scratches his tummy with the tip of her

I think in some ways it's like that for all of us, living with the ghosts of things that used to be, or never were. We're all of us haunted by yesterday, and we got no choice but to keep marching into our tomorrows. Keep marching, boys and girls. Keep marching.

You can take him, right? he asks a couple minutes later. I go, Are you kidding? You can't just fight Blade, you have to fight his gang, too. You mean you couldn't take him and I was giving him lip?

You can remember anything if you try hard enough.

You can't hate a proov when you're near one, because you want to be like them, you ache to be like them. You want to be perfect, too, and you know if you were improved you'd act just like they do, and feel what they feel, and glide through the world with sky-colored eyes and hair like sunlight, and nothing dirty or broken could ever touch you.

So what happens when proovs get old? he asks, as if the subject is close to his heart. They age gracefully, Lanaya says with a smile. That's the best we can do.

I don't suppose anybody really knows how bad a thing can be until it actually happens.

Take away memory—the sense of who we are—and human beings revert to animal behavior, Ryter says. And animals are easier to exterminate than humans.

Until I saw what happened to Mongo, I thought that getting canceled was the worst thing that could happen. Wrong. Being dead and not knowing it is much, much worse.

Do not despair, my friend. Today is theirs, but the future is ours.

As far as I'm concerned, taking a bath is sort of like drowning, with soap.

I started writing stories in sixth grade. But writing wasn't cool, like being good at sports, or being part of the in crowd, or winning fights on the playground.

It all boils down to this: A person has only two options in life, to do something or to do nothing.

I assumed 'Freak the Mighty' was probably too weird and melodramatic to find a publisher. I certainly never expected the book to have a profound influence on my career as a writer, but indeed it has.

I vividly remember my sixth-grade classroom. I remember what it smelled like, where I sat, what I could see out the window, and how I felt about things. Peel away my decrepit middle-aged exterior, and an important part of me is still twelve years old. It helps me when I sit down to write stories for kids.

The only real treasure is in your head. Memories are better than diamonds and nobody can steal them from you

Pain is just a state of mind. You can think your way out of everything, even pain.

Bean finds the best apple in our tree and hands it up to me. "You know what this tastes like when you first bite into it?" she asks. "No, what?" "Blue sky." "You're zoomed." "You ever eat blue sky?" "No," I admit. "Try it sometime," she says. "It's apple-flavored.

Sure it will hurt. But so what? Pain is just a state of mind. You can think your way out of anything, even pain.

Remembering is a great invention of the mind.