Favourite Quotes from the Last Five Books I Read

I have always enjoyed reading book quotes, so I decided that for 2019 I will share my favourite quotes for every five books that I read! These are quotes that stood out to me, but will in no way spoil the book for you.  I hope they give you a sense of what the book is about and the writing style!

Radium Girls by Kate Moore

The cynical would say there was only one reason a high-profile specialist finally took up the cause. On June 7, 1925, the first male employee of the United States Radium Corporation died.

The girls shone “like the watches did in the darkroom,” as though they themselves were timepieces, counting down the seconds as they passed.

“It is an offense against Morals and Humanity,” he concluded, “and, just incidentally, against the law.”

All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews

It was the first time that we had sort of articulated our major problem. She wanted to die and I wanted her to live and we were enemies who loved each other.

… to survive something we first need to know what it is we are surviving.

Go into hard things quickly, eagerly, then retreat. It’s the same for thinking, writing, and life.

The Stranger Beside Me by Ann Rule

Yet, in reality, Ted loved things more than he loved people. He could find life in an abandoned bicycle or an old car, and feel a kind of compassion for these inanimate objects, more compassion than he could ever feel for another human being.

As I write these recollections of women who survived, I hope my readers are taking careful note of why they did.
They screamed.
They fought.
They slammed doors in a stranger’s face.
They ran.
They doubted glib stories.
They spotted flaws in those stories.
They were lucky enough to have someone step up and protect them.

The most basic bit of advice given to women who have to walk alone at night is, ‘Look alert. Be aware of your surroundings and walk briskly. You will be safer if you know where you are going, and if anyone who observes you senses that.’ The stalking, predatory animal cuts the weakest from the pack, and then kills at his leisure.

Anne of Green Gables: A Graphic Novel by Mariah Marsden

“Its strange to love a place like you would a person, but I do!”

“I couldn’t let you sacrifice yourself for me.”

“Its not a sacrifice. My ambition has just changed.”

Disoriental by Negar Djavadi

To really integrate into a culture, I can tell you that you have to disintegrate first … from your own.

In Paris, we didn’t talk to each other anymore, about anything. None of us. Each of us was shut up in a silence mode of stupefaction and adjustment. In a state of unconsciousness. The past was just anecdotes now, that could be retold, but were only a vast, white, ruined wasteland.

With the passage of time, the flesh of events decomposes, leaving only a skeleton of impressions on which to embroider. Undoubtedly there will come a day when even the impressions will only be a memory. And then there won’t be anything left to tell.