Quotes by American Authors - Page 2030

Part of what I love about novels and dogs is that they are so beautifully oblivious to economic concerns. We serve them, and in return they thrive. It's not their responsibility to figure out where the rent is coming from.
Ann Patchett
Maybe we are less than our dreams, but that less would make us more than some gods would dream of.
Corita Kent
The people need a hero. But all they've got is . . . me.
Christopher Healy
He was like a man thinking on an abstract subject all the time.
H.W. Brands
The moment we accept our pain is the moment we release our suffering. Suffering is created when we offer life resistance, and what we resist most are the experiences that bring us pain.
Alaric Hutchinson
The cult of self dominates our cultural landscape. This cult has within it the classic traits of psychopaths: superficial charm, grandiosity, and self-importance; a need for constant stimulation, a penchant for lying, deception, and manipulation, and the inability to feel remorse or guilt. This is, of course, the ethic promoted by corporations. It is the ethic of unfettered capitalism. It is the misguided belief that personal style and personal advancement, mistaken for individualism, are the same as democratic equality. In fact, personal style, defined by the commodities we buy or consume, has become a compensation for our loss of democratic equality. We have a right, in the cult of the self, to get whatever we desire. We can do anything, even belittle and destroy those around us, including our friends, to make money, to be happy, and to become famous. Once fame and wealth are achieved, they become their own justification, their own morality. How one gets there is irrelevant. Once you get there, those questions are no longer asked.
Chris Hedges
Perhaps the strangest manifestation of the Eurocentric approach to the history of military technology is ... the attempt to discern fundamental cultural roots in the distant past that have resulted in the perceived current Western dominance of the world. This essentialism attempts to contrast ancient Greek logic and philosophy with the less rationally minded philosophies of the non-West. Modern science and technology, in this view, is a simple jump from ancient Greece to early modern Europe.
Peter A. Lorge
No two of us learn our language alike, nor, in a sense, does any finish learning it while he lives.
Willard Van Orman Quine
First of all, he was not my type. He was nice, considerate, unselfish and grounded; qualities I’d never experienced in a man. Usually, I went for the self centered, screwed up, “I’m lost, will you be my mother” type.
Brenda Perlin
It's not always wise to assume that just because the surface of the world appears undisturbed, life is where you left it.
Jan Ellison
The introduction to horrors so young impressed on me just how helpless and vulnerable I was. Parents are supposed to empower their children to live without them but in my family, I wasn’t given permission to be my own person. I thought I needed them to live and then they abandoned me. It’s no wonder I felt so unempowered well into my adult years.
Christina Enevoldsen
A phenomenon noticeable throughout history regardless of place or period is the pursuit by governments of policies contrary to their own interests. Mankind, it seems, makes a poorer performance of government than of almost any other human activity. In this sphere, wisdom, which may be defined as the exercise of judgment acting on experience, common sense and available information, is less operative and more frustrated than it should be. Why do holders of high office so often act contrary to the way reason points and enlightened self-interest suggests? Why does intelligent mental process seem so often not to function?
Barbara W. Tuchman
There comes a time when all the secrets are told and all that is left are their spent ghosts.
Rene Denfield
I could feel the urgency in the driver’s voice as he prodded the horses to greater momentum. The rumble of thunder could be heard rolling through the mountains as foreboding dark clouds rolled overhead obscuring the starry sky.  The sun vanished with one last glimmer through the pine trees, then night took possession of the earth. 
Rhiannon Frater
Sometimes my body wakes me up and says 'Hey, you haven't had pain in a while. How about pain?' And sometimes I can't breathe, and that's hard to live with. But I still celebrate life and don't give up.
Mattie Stepanek
I think that positivity— real positivity— is like the butterflies. The whole essence of the butterfly: caterpillar, cocoon, winged creature. When I look at a butterfly, I not only see a winged beauty, but I also see a strong beauty! A mind that decided: "I'm going to become better, I'm not going to be afraid of the dark, I'm going to roll myself up in this thing that I am and I will come out winged and colourful." A butterfly can never become a butterfly unless the caterpillar realises that it needs to become one. This, to me, is true positivity. I don't like what others do— the way they paint on colours and tape on wings. I like what the caterpillars do. They truly BECOME.
C. JoyBell C.
The broken spine of the book shows the webbing of binder's string, and my fingers have worn white spots in the cover.
Susan Straight
The first principle of life is love. The second principle is kindness. The third principle is compassion. The fourth principle is trust. The firth principle is integrity.
Debasish Mridha
It’s easy to point out someone else’s mistake, harder to recognize your own. Especially because most people—except the lucky few like ourselves—are forced to live with their mistakes. So they learn to justify their mistakes, build on them, until they can look back and convince themselves that their mistake was inevitable all along, a good choice, in fact. An unwed teenage mother can look back at her unexpected pregnancy fondly six years down the road once the child’s out of her hair and in school all day. She wouldn’t dare go back and fix that mistake because it’s become part of her life.
Andrea Lochen
I don't know why we take our worst moods so much more seriously than our best, crediting depression with more clarity than euphoria. We dismiss peak moments and passionate love affairs as an ephemeral chemical buzz, just endorphins or hormones, but accept those 3 a.m. bouts of despair as unsentimental insights into the truth about our lives.
Tim Kreider
I hate seeing poetry in everything I touch. I hate that I can no longer love you without turning you into a metaphor - that it can never be simple as looking at you and saying yes, yes, yes.
Shinji Moon
No more sex."I blink several times at Anna as we stand outside the car the next morning. Have we been married long enough for her to say that?
Wendy Higgins
Public transit situates us so that we are given license to accept what's right in front of us, but will likely arouse our desire to compare our narrative to someone else's, to give ourselves permission to speculate upon a person's private space, or life, with no fear of recourse or punishment.
Julie Wilson
Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns in to universal, rather than religion-specific, values... it requires that their proposals be subject to argument and amenable to reason.Now I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons, to take one example, but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God's will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all.
Barack Obama
Thirteen years of friendship had bonded us together more thoroughly than if we had been born of the same mother. Even at this late stage, I was unwilling to let him go.
Melika Dannese Lux
May your life be filled, as mine has been, with love and laughter; and remember, when things are rough all you need is ... Chocolate.
Geraldine Solon
Originality is the key to being memorable.
Suzy Kassem
It is well for people who think to change their minds occasionally in order to keep them clean. For those who do not think it is best at least to rearrange their prejudices once in a while.
Luther Burbank
As long as Christianity is the dominant belief system in America, we cannot afford to be biblically or theologically illiterate, regardless of our personal beliefs. (p. 8)
Robin R. Meyers
A goal ensures progress. But one gets much further without a goal.
Marty Rubin
The thing about plummetting downhill at fifty miles an hour on a snack platter - if you realize it's a bad idea when you're halfway down, it's too late.
Rick Riordan
God is the ultimate recycler. We have a good planet here. It has its troubles, yes. We have overpopulation, we have pollution, we have global warming, we have the Thursday night television lineup,” more laughter, “and, of course, we have the infected. We have a lot of problems on Earth, and it might seem like a great idea to hold the Rapture now—why wait? Let’s move on to Heaven, and leave the trials and tribulations of our earthly existence behind us. Let’s get while the getting’s good, and beat the rush.“It might seem like a great idea, but I don’t think it is, for the same reason I don’t think it’s a great idea for a first grader to stand up and say that he’s learned enough, he’s done with school, thanks a lot but he’s got it from here. Compared to God, we’re barely out of kindergarten, and like any good teacher, I don’t believe He intends to let us out of class just because we’re finding the lessons a little difficult. I don’t know whether I believe in the Rapture or not. I believe that if God wants to do it, He will… but I don’t believe that it’s coming in our lifetime. We have too much work left to do right here.
Mira Grant
He was ugly, himself. Weird-ugly. But ugliness in a man doesn't matter, much. Ugliness in a woman is her life.
Joyce Carol Oates
How different her life would be if Orrin hadn’t contacted her in July. She wouldn’t be embroiled in kidnapping, espionage, and murder.
Donna Grant
Put in the work. Reap the rewards
Bobby F. Kimbrough Jr.
[death]...the abyss from where no traveler is permitted to return
George Washington
Church and family are both primary influences designed by God for a purpose and when they work together, they are orange. Both are systems comprised of imperfect people—that’s why God desires to use them as a platform to tell his story of restoration and redemption to the world.
Reggie Joiner
Take a risk on messy. Live Fearlessly. Love recklessly. Most of all, just love.
Julie Johnson
My grandmother started walking five miles a day when she was sixty. She's ninety-seven now, and we don't know where the heck she is.
Ellen DeGeneres
I do not pretend to know what many ignorant men are sure of.
Clarence Darrow
A doctor must work eighteen hours a day and seven days a week. If you cannot console yourself to this, get out of the profession.
Martin H. Fischer
Certainly she could never have exchanged pleasantries with anyone. What would there be for them to say anyway? Sorry? Sorry your daughter is dead, Sorry your daughter jumped off the roof of her school when you were on your way to pick her up. Sorry you were late. Too bad you'll be reliving that failure for the rest of your miserable life.
Kimberly McCreight
Give me the strength to leaf, for I fear otherwise we may hang ourselves.
Stephanie Hemphill
It dawned on me that no person is as poetically homesick as someone who has come to New York for the first time and glimpsed a small vestige of her home state.
Suzanne Rindell
What did you give your kids, besides a lottery of genes? A stance--that mix of bluff and confidence, backbone and wussiness that passes for personality or character. One talks less about ethics after third grade. Don't steal candy or hit other children, if they hadn't learned the costs of violence on their own.
Edward Hoagland
I have a secret passion for mercy. But justice is what keeps happening to people.
Ross Macdonald
You cannot defend your design without knowing what you're designing for.
I.M. Pei
Before you go out and occupy Wall Street, occupy your own brain!
Tai Lopez
I adore Wilkie Collins,” Tessa cried. “Oh—Armadale! And The Woman in White …Are you laughing at me?”“Not at you,” said Will, grinning, “more because of you. I’ve never seen anyone get soexcited over books before. You’d think they were diamonds.”“Well, they are, aren’t they? Isn’t there anything you love like that? And don’t say ‘spats’ or ‘lawn tennis’ or something silly.”“Good Lord,” he said with mock horror, “it’s like she knows me already.
Cassandra Clare
You know what the great thing about babies is? They are like little bundles of hope. Like the future in a basket.
Lish McBride
It's the hardest thing in the world to put yourself in someone else's place, try to really feel what they feel, figure out why they do the things they do. Especially when it's easier to stick a label on something. Or someone.
David Baldacci
This was a normal town once, and we were normal people. Most of us worked at the plastics factory on the outskirts of town. Then one day there was an accident... something escaped from the factory, a yellow gas. It floated over the town so fast that we didn't see it, didn't realize... and then it was too late, and Dark Falls wasn't a normal town anymore.
R.L.Stine
A smile opened, thin as a paper cut, in the bottom of Flowers's face.
Michael Chabon
Maybe you receive pain selfishly — thinking only of yourself. The cycle of pain wounds every participant.
Bryant McGill
If there was a light at the end of the tunnel, the flickering bulb above my head wasn’t it. The faces of my tormentors were no angels—they were hell’s minions and I’d stepped into their purgatory.
Susan Illene
Ah, if he had ever been a slave he would have known how difficult it was to trust white men.
Harriet Jacobs
Sinful pleasure can ruin our appetite for the things of God.
Billy Graham
Look around. The hantavirus is waiting for you. Ebola and the tropical rainforest is cooking up all kinds of brews to make sure that the population is kept in control. All these things are necessary. Why is there an increase in sexual deviance right now? Because it goes against procreative sex. Mother Nature does not want more children. This is not a time of birth. It is not a time to give birth, it's a time to die. The Bible says all things under heaven and that includes death as well as life. You out there, you comfortable ones, you point the finger. You say the junkie is the problem, you say the sexual deviant, serial killer, racist, and the man who hates his fellow man is the problem. But they ain't the problem. You're the problem. The sexual deviant, the murderer, the serial killer, the taker of human life is the cure, you're the problem.
Joe Coleman
If I'd waited until I was well rested to read, I never would have read anything.
Will Schwalbe
Manners without sincerity, is called polite society
Josh Stern