Quotes from Jodi Picoult

You didn't get past something like that, you go through it -- and for that reason alone, I understood more about her than she ever would have guessed.

well, sometimes to get what you want the most, you have to do what you want the least.

There's a lot of things you can't see if you aren't' looking.

Mistakes are like the memories you hide in an attic: old love letters from relationships that tanked, photos of dead relatives, toys from a childhood you miss. Out of sight is out of mind, but somewhere deep inside you know they still exist. And you also know that you're avoiding them.

It just goes to show you: every baby is born beautiful. It's what we project on them that makes them ugly.

There is no one truth. There's only what happened, based on how you perceive it.

I know what love is. When you find the person you are supposed to love, bells ring and fireworks go off in your head and you can't find the words to speak and you think about him all the time. When you find the person you are supposed to love, you will know by staring deeply into their eyes.

there was not much distinction between losing a friend and a lover: it was all about intimacy. One moment, you had someone to share your biggest triumph, and fatal flaws with; the next minute, you had to keep them bottled inside.

What if the puzzle of the world was a shape you didn't fit into? And the only way to survive was to mutilate yourself, carve away your corners, sand yourself down, modify yourself to fit? How come we haven't been able to change the puzzle instead?

What's the difference between spending your life trying to be invisible, or pretending to be the person you think everyone wants you to be? Either way, you're faking.

Life isn't nearly as stable as we want it to be.

When someone dies, it feels like the hole in your gum when a tooth falls out. You can chew, you can eat, you have plenty of other teeth, but your tongue keeps going back to that empty place, where all the nerves are still a little raw.

Eventually, I told myself not to expect anything from him, and as a result it has gotten easier for me to take what comes.

I have never fit into this town, this marriage, this skin. I am the child who was picked last to play tag; I am the girl who laughed although she did not get the joke; I am the piecemeal part of you that you pretend doesn't exist, except it is all I am, all the time.

Maybe if God gives you a handicap, he makes sure you've got a few extra doses of humor to take the edge off.

Parenting is really just a matter of tracking, of hoping your kids do not get so far ahead you can no longer see their next moves.

It felt like I'd been living underground, and for a moment, I'd been given this glimpse of the sky. Once you've seen that, how can you go back where you came from?

The truth was, history repeated itself on a daily basis; mistakes were made over and over. People were haunted by what they had done, and by what they hadn't had time to do.

You know what the difference is between a dream and a goal?... A plan.

If you think about someone you've loved and lost, you are already with them. The rest is just details.

Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are. —BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

They're fake bullets, so why do I feel like Im bleeding out?

Rest easy, real mothers. The very fact that you worry about being a good mom means that you already are one.

I could tell her from personal experience that when people we love make choices we don't always understand them. But we can go on loving them, just the same. It isn't a matter of comprehension. It's forgiveness. But all this took me a lifetime to discover, and where has it gotten me?... Some lessons can't be taught, they simply have to be learned.