Top 283 Quotes & Sayings by Holly Black - Page 2

The first boy I fell in love with didn't know I loved him, but he managed to break my heart anyway.

You both ... you both saved me?" "Come on," said Luis. "You make it sound like it was hard for Val to go to the Unseelie Court, strike a deal with Roiben, challenge Mabry to a duel, win back your heart, and then get back here during rush hour.

I can learn to live with guilt. I don't care about being good.

You can always count on your family to love you. And to betray you. And then to feel guilty about it.

We are, largely, who we remember ourselves to be

He wondered whether growing up was learning that most stories turned out to be lies.

The row of dolls watched her impassively from the bookshelf, their tea party propriety almost certainly offended.

Can't get away from your own self.

Life is like licking Honey from a Thorn

They say that nameless things change constantly—that names fix them in place like pins.

whatever you love, that is your weakness

Ah coffee. The sweet balm by which we shall accomplish today's tasks.

I'm the best kind of thief, the kind that leaves behind items equal in value to those he's stolen.

What an author doesn't know could fill a book.

She wears trouble like a crown. If she ever falls in love, she’ll fall like a comet, burning the sky as she goes.

She looks honestly upset, but then, I’ve learned that I can’t read her. The problem with a really excellent liar is that you have to just assume they’re always lying.

I thought you needed to be tougher. But I've been thinking that protecting somebody by hurting them before someone else gets the chance isn't the kind of protecting that anybody wants.

And stupid. Brave and Stupid." Ravus smiled, but then his smile sagged. "But nothing can stop you from being terrible once you've learned how.

Life's full of opportunities to make crappy decisions that feel good. And after the first one, the rest get a whole lot easier.

Librarians are hot. They have knowledge and power over their domain...It is no coincidence how many librarians are portrayed as having a passionate interior, hidden by a cool layer of reserve. Aren't books like that? On the shelf, their calm covers belie the intense experience of reading one. Reading inflames the soul. Now, what sort of person would be the keeper of such books?

There’s people who do things and people who never do—who say they will someday, but they just don’t. I want to go on a quest. I’ve always wanted to go on a quest. And now that I have one, I’m not backing down from it. I’m not going home until it’s complete.

If she was going to die, she might as well die sarcastic.

I heard you've been having some problems with your girlfriend." Headmistress Northcutt says. "No," I say. "Not at all." Audrey broke up with me after the winter holiday, exhausted by my moodiness. It's impossible to have problems with a girlfriend who's no longer mine.

She wants me to take out Patton.” Barron’s brows draw together. “Take out? As in transform him?” “No,” I say. “As in take out to dinner. She thinks we’d make a good couple.

She sat in the dew-damp grass and ripped up clumps of it, tossing them in the air and feeling vaguely guilty about it. Some gnome ought to pop out of the tree and scold her for torturing the lawn.

I survive at the edge of friends circles.

I thought weirdness was a good thing. I don't mean that defensively, either. I thought it was something to be cultivated.

Mine. The language of love is like that, possessive. That should be the first warning that it's not going to encourage anyone's betterment.

But now I wonder--what if everyone is pretty much the same and it's just a thousand small choices that add up to the person you are? No good or evil, no black and white, no inner demons or angels whispering the right answers in our ears like it's some cosmic SAT test. Just us, hour by hour, minute by minute, day by day,making the best choices we can. The thought is horrifying. If that's true, then there's no right choice. There's only choice.

I'm not very good at explaining things," she said. "But I think you have beautiful eyes. I love the gold in them. I love that they're different from my eyes- I see mine all the time and I'm bored with them.

This, the language of deception, we both understand. We were born to it, along with the curses.

I love you, you see...and I fear I have no way to say or show it that isn't terrible, except coming here. I would kill everyone in the world for you, if you wanted.......Or not obviously

It’s sweet. All this trouble for a kitty.

Philip Sharpe was a soldier in God's army," says the minister. "Now he marches with the angels.

I need to talk to you. I had a weird dream." "Let me guess. You got tied up by lady ninjas. With big hooters." "Uh, no." I take a sip of coffee and wince. It was ridiculously strong. My grandfather shoves a strip of bacon in his mouth with a grin. "Guess it would have been kind of weird if we'd had the same dream." I roll my eyes. "Well, you'd better not tell me anything else. Don't ruin the surprise in case I have it tonight.

Marks forget that whenever something's too good to be true, that's because it's a con.

To remind me, pain is the best teacher

No trouble ever got fixed late at night," he said. "Midnight is for regrets.

The moment she was cursed, I lost her. Once it wears off- soon- she will be embarrassed to remember things that she said, things she did, things like this. No matter how solid she feels in my arms, she is made of smoke.

Farewell, Father," she said. He fell back upon his chair, choking. She laughed, not with mirth or even mockery, but something that was closer to a sob. "You crafted me so sharp, I cut even myself.

On the way out to the car, Philip turns to me. “How could you be so stupid? I shrug, stung in spite of myself. “I thought I grew out of it.” Philip pulls out his key fob and presses the remote to unlock his Mercedes. I slide into the passenger side, brushing coffee cups off the seat and onto the floor mat, where crumpled printouts from MapQuest soak up any spilled liquid. “I hope you mean sleepwalking,” Philip says, “since you obviously didn’t grow out of stupid.

Baby," she says in a harsh whisper, "in this world, lots of people will try to grind you down. They need you to be small so they can be big. You let them think whatever they want, but you make sure you get yours. You get yours.

Yeah, the whole family knows. It's no big deal. One night at dinner I said, 'Mom, you know the forbidden love that Spock has for Kirk? Well, me too.' It was easier for her to understand that way.

The truth is messy. It's raw and uncomfortable. You can't blame people for preferring lies.

I did it to get what I want. Maybe I should regret that, but I can’t. Sometimes you do the bad thing and hope for the good result.

I got bored," he says. "Besides, you know what's creepier than walking around your dead brothers' apartment? Sitting alone in a hearse in front of his apartment.

It's not that I don't know that it's a bad idea. It's that, lately, bad ideas have a particular hold over me.

Don't be drinking the Haterade.

You in trouble?” Sam asks. The way he says it, I wonder if he’s thinking about how to get out of here if I am.

I’m Lila, and yes, he’s crazy. But you must have noticed that before now. He was crazy back when I knew him, and he’s obviously gotten crazier over time.

You better get over here with my car,” Grandad says. “Before I call the cops and tell them you stole it.” “Sorry,” I say contritely. Then the rest of what he said sinks in and I laugh. “Wait, did you just threaten me with calling the police? Because that I’d like to see.

Pet the cat dude," says Sam. "She brought you a present. She wants you to tell her how badass she is." "You are a tiny tiny killing machine." Daneca coos. "What's she doing?" I ask. "Purring!" says Daneca. She sounds delighted. "Good kitty. Who's an amazing killing machine? That's right. You are! You are a brutal brutal tiny lion! Yes, you are.

Someone could cut through the mess in our house and look at it like one might look at rings on a tree or layers of sediment. They'd find the black-and-white hairs of a dog we had when I was six, the acid-washed jeans my mother once wore, the seven blood-soaked pillowcases from the time I skinned my knee. All our family secrets rest in endless piles.

If you keep it," Daneca says, "he'll have his claws in you." Everyone has their claws in me. Everyone.

Let her alone,' said the enkanto, 'or I will curse you blind, lame, and worse.' The old man laughed. 'I'm a curse breaker, fool.' The elf grabbed one of the Jim Beam bottles from the table and slammed it down, so that he was holding a jagged glass neck. The elf smiled a very thin smile. 'Then I won't bother with magic.

You don't have to protect these people, Cassel." I am these people.

She suddenly understood why she had let him kiss her in the diner, why she had wanted him at all. She wanted to control him. He was every arrogant boyfriend that had treated her mother badly. He was every boy that told her she was too freaky, who had laughed at her, or just wanted her to shut up and make out. He was a thousand times less real than Roiben.

You can break a thing, but you cannot always guide it afterward into the shape you want.

She put a hit on her boyfriend, so it's not like she hasn't murdered someone." "And you know that how?" Sam asks. I'm trying really hard to be honest, but telling the whole thing to Sam seems beyond me. Still, the fragments sound ridiculous on their own. "She said so. In the park." He rolls his eyes. "Because the two of you were so friendly." "I guess she mistook me for someone else." I sound so much like Philip that it scares me. I can hear the menace in my tone. "Who?" Sam asks, not flinching. I force my voice back to normal. "Uh, the person who killed him.

Downstairs, Grandad's warning Barron about something. His voice swells, and I catch the words, "In my day we were feared. Now we're just afraid.