Quotes from Neal Shusterman

Now he's far away, floating in the clouds, playing Scrabble with the Dalai Lama, but wouldn't you know it, all the tiles are in Tibetan.

The best you can really hope for is a family where everyone's problems, big and small, work together. Kind of like an orchestra where every instrument is out of tune, in exactly the same way, so you don't really notice

Yes, yes, but you have to remember people take from a situation the thing that they need.

We do, you know. Find ourselves. Although it's a little harder each time. Days pass. Weeks. Then we squeeze ourselves back into the skin of who we were before all this. We put the pieces back together and get on with things.

The stars will go dark and the universe will end before I get this year back. That is the weight chained to my ankle, and it is far heavier than any anchor. That is the overwhelming never that I must face. And I still don't know if I'll disappear into it, or find a way to push beyond.

I have to realize that there are only two perfect acts. They are the two most important acts known to me, but I forbid myself to perform them, and leave them in the hands of humankind. They are the creation of life... and life's taking.

You make errors all the time...as does every other human being ever lived. Error is an intrinsic part of the human condition- and it is something I deeply love about humankind.

The two of them playact with each other, pretending to be cordial, but only so it will make the final betrayal even sweeter.

The question is, will poisoning the voices kill them, or just make them really, really pissed off?

Correction must be about lifting one up from one's poor choices and prior deeds. As long as remorse is sincere, and one is willing to make recompense, there is no purpose to suffering.

That which hides in plain sight is the most difficult thing to find.

Makes sense, the earth is quick to consume the flesh of things that ain't natural.

You want to be left alone, but you're afraid to be left alone, but you're afraid to not be left alone.

Live by your impulses, and you'll be just like them. You're better than that, aren't you, Red?

No matter how smart we think we are, we simply can't know all there is to now-and if you spend all your time thinking about those things, it will drive you crazy.

while an adult could rarely be universally loved, everyone could love the right kid.

I ain't no runaway, I'm a run-to.

There are worse things than being robbed... I could smell the sick old-meat stench on his breath, like he really had eaten my grandmother. ...worse things than dyin' even. You be a good boy, Little Red, and maybe you'll get to live awhile. Maybe you'll get to die in your own natural time.

Death makes the world kin.

If it was a time bomb, then what she had done that day was started the clock.

Of course, the bad scythes weren't all in the past. But instead of "bad" they were now called "innovative" and "forward-thinking.

He had been in Citra's embrace, the two of them cloaked in the robes of founding scythes Prometheus and Cleopatra, as Endura sank beneath the Atlantic. But those robes did not stay on for long.

Everyone's going to remember where they were when the taps went dry, I think. Like when a president is assassinated.

Setting an example presupposes that someone will be left to learn from it. It's pointless when there's no one to set an example for.