Quotes from Jodi Picoult

Maybe however much you've loved someone, that's how much you can hate. It's like a pocket turned inside out. It stands to reason that the opposite should be true, too.

Could something that looked so wrong on the outside turn out to be undeniably right?

Some feel that because they lived, it's their responsibility to tell the world what happened, so it won't happen again, and so people won't forget. Others believe that the only way to go on with the rest of their lives is to act as if it never happened.

It's called acting. It's not all that difficult to be the person people expect you to be. It's harder to remember who your really are.

I've always wondered whether she sees what I do when I look at her.

Let me tell you this: if you meet a loner, no matter what they tell you, it's not because they enjoy solitude. It's because they have tried to blend into the world before, and people continue to disappoint them.

True love is felonious...You take someones breath away...You rob them of the ability to utter a single word...You steal a heart.

Beliefs are the roads we take to our dreams. Believe you can do something-or believe you can't-and you'll be right everytime.

People have to experience things that terrify them. If they don't, how will they ever come to appreciate safety?

Love is not an equation, it is not a contract, and it is not a happy ending. Love is the slate under the chalk, the ground that buildings rise, and the oxygen in the air. It is the place you come back to, no matter where your headed.

History isn't about dates and places and wars. It's about the people who fill the spaces between them.

I used to pretend that I was just passing through this family on my way to my real one.

In my family, we seem to have a tortured history of not saying what we ought to and not meaning what we do.

There are so many ways a family can unravel. All it takes is a tiny slash of selfishness, a rip of greed, a puncture of bad luck. And yet, woven tightly, family can be the strongest bond imaginable.

Having a fantasy come true doesn't always mean it will be permanent.

When I was little I bragged about my firefighting father: my father would go to heaven, because if he went to hell he would put out all the fires.

All it takes is a second and your whole life can get turned upside down.

I always hated when my scars started to fade, because as long as I could still see them, I knew why I was hurting.

Once you had put the pieces back together, even though you may look intact, you were never quite the same as you'd been before the fall.

Forgiveness is spiritual. Punishment is legal," Leo says. "They're not mutually exclusive.

When you're different, sometimes you don't see the millions of people who accept you for what you are. All you notice is the person who doesn't.

My mother...she is beautiful, softened at the edges and tempered with a spine of steel. I want to grow old and be like her.

You don't love someone because they're perfect, you love them in spite of the fact that they're not

You know it's never fifty-fifty in a marriage. It's always seventy-thirty, or sixty-forty. Someone falls in love first. Someone puts someone else up on a pedestal. Someone works very hard to keep things rolling smoothly; someone else sails along for the ride.