Quotes from Maureen Johnson

It's been a long week," Nate said. "Don't leave again. Don't leave me with these people." "Which people?" "Any people." "I don't count as people?" "Of course not," he said. "It's been all feelings and love. I want to go back to numbness and avoidance. You're great at that stuff.

Shame is like melting. You can actually feel your muscles sag and drop, as if your body is preparing you to crawl, or possibly ooze, to the nearest exit.

She called, Au ror a! in a penetrating voice that could cause a small bird to fall dead out of the sky.

I had always liked him, but it never occurred to me to like him, like him.

Her parents had no idea that you could meet people outside of school and it wasn't freaky and the internet was the way of finding your people.

Then I noticed his rising blush, and I realized something. Tobin and Angie . . . their togetherness was new. New enough that being touched by her still came as a glorious, blush-worthy surprise.

Perhaps it sounds like a wonderful thing to be born and raised in a small hotel in New York City. Lots of things sound fun until they are subjected to closer inspection. If you lived on a cruise ship, for example, you would have to do the Macarena every night of your life. Think about that.

Villagers love to remember the glorious old days, when they used to skewer one another with sticks, fire muskets into one another's faces, and cut off their neighbors' heads in the name of king or country or whatever they were into back then.

I'll go to Venice and drown my sorrows.

Why was she so anxious? Because she had anxiety.

I know no one is perfect, that behind every facade of perfection is a writhing mess of subterfuge and secret sorrows... but even taking that into account, Noah was pretty much perfect.

I like to look nice when I go to see His Majesty, the Burger King.

Slippers always seemed like kind of a nonsense item until she came to Ellingham and felt the bathroom floor on the first proper day of wintry weather. Once skin touched tile and part of her soul died, she knew what slippers were for.

Annoy a Southerner and we will drain away the moments of your life with our slow, detailed replies until you are nothing but a husk of your former self and that much closer to death.

If they bulge in the brain or anywhere else of interest, the wallet is a good alternate location. And I should know.

For you, there is underage, and then, there is underage. I believe a taste of wine is perfectly acceptable, but please stick to one glass tonight. Now, let's work on ambiance.

Reading is on of the greatest pleasure of life - maybe the greatest. It's true. All the money, all the power - none of it compares to a good book. A book gives you everything. It gives you a window into other souls, other worlds. The world is a door. Books are the key -Albert Ellingham

Charles had a look on his face said, I'm not angry, but I am disappointed. Dr. Quinn's expression said, He's passive-aggressive. I'm not. I am aggressive. I have killed before.

I felt so alone on that train... a weird, unnatural kind of alone that bore into me. It was feeling just beyond fear and somewhere to the left of sadness.

Sometimes anxiety did that—it could slow you down or speed you up.

Except for his eyes. Those were completely bloodshot. "What time did you get up?" David said, looking him over. "Four twenty?

That's the thing about speaking—you can talk and talk and have no idea at all what the words leaving your mouth mean, or where they came from.

It just seemed like telling the truth would mean admitting some weakness

Lies are a tremendous karmic setback. Keep it up and you'll come back in the next life as something without a spine. You're not fine. And you don't have to be fine.