Ashley > Ashley's Quotes

“Maybe love shouldn’t be built on a foundation of compromises, but maybe it can’t exist without them either. Not the kind that forces two people into shapes they don’t fit in, but the kind that loosens their grips, always leaves room to grow. Compromises that say, there will be a you-shaped space in my heart, and if your shape changes, I will adapt. No matter where we go, our love will stretch out to hold us, and that makes me feel like … like everything will be okay.”
― Emily Henry, Book Lovers

“Sometimes, even when you start with the last page and you think you know everything, a book finds a way to surprise you.”
― Emily Henry, Book Lovers

“The last-page ache. The deep breath in after you’ve set the book aside.”
― Emily Henry, Book Lovers

“Nora.” He just barely smiles. “You’re in books. Of course you don’t have a life. None of us do. There’s always something too good to read.”
― Emily Henry, Book Lovers

“That’s life. You’re always making decisions, taking paths that lead you away from the rest before you can see where they end. Maybe that’s why we as a species love stories so much. All those chances for do-overs, opportunities to live the lives we’ll never have.”
― Emily Henry, Book Lovers

“nothing knows the sound of abandonment like a highway does, not even God.”
― Hanif Abdurraqib, The Crown Ain't Worth Much

“A piano can coax even the most vicious of ghosts out of a body”
― Hanif Abdurraqib, The Crown Ain't Worth Much

“I look up and ask myself again why the stars have so long tolerated the audacity of clouds”
― Hanif Abdurraqib, The Crown Ain't Worth Much

“Never trust people who don't have something in their lives that they love beyond all reason.”
― Fredrik Backman, Beartown

“If you are honest, people may deceive you. Be honest anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfishness. Be kind anyway. All the good you do today will be forgotten by others tomorrow. Do good anyway.”
― Fredrik Backman, Beartown

“You never have the sort of friends you have when you’re fifteen ever again. Even if you keep them for the rest of your life, it’s never the same as it was then.”
― Fredrik Backman, Beartown

“She is told all the things she shouldn’t have done: She shouldn’t have waited so long before going to the police. She shouldn’t have gotten rid of the clothes she was wearing. Shouldn’t have showered. Shouldn’t have drunk alcohol. Shouldn’t have put herself in that situation. Shouldn’t have gone into the room, up the stairs, given him the impression. If only she hadn’t existed, then none of this would have happened, why didn’t she think of that?”
― Fredrik Backman, Beartown

“Perhaps one day the man in the black jacket will think about this too: why he only wondered if it was Kevin or Amat who was telling the truth. Why Maya’s word wasn’t enough.”
― Fredrik Backman, Beartown

“Favorite word?” he whispers.
I don’t even hesitate: “You.”
― Christina Lauren, Love and Other Words

“I’ve been waiting for you to come home for eleven years. I’ll go anywhere you go.”
― Christina Lauren, Love and Other Words

“Treat your body carefully. Take care of it. Don’t let anyone abuse it, and don’t abuse it yourself. Every inch of your skin I made diligently; months I slaved over you. You are my masterpiece.”
― Christina Lauren, Love and Other Words

“Reading is a hobby, but for some of us, it’s an escape from the difficulties we face. To all of you who escape into books, I want to thank you for escaping into this one.”
― Colleen Hoover, Reminders of Him

“We’re all just a bunch of sad people doing what we have to do to make it until tomorrow.”
― Colleen Hoover, Reminders of Him

“Maybe it doesn’t matter whether something is a coincidence or a sign. Maybe the best way to cope with the loss of the people we love is to find them in as many places and things as we possibly can. And in the off chance that the people we lose are still somehow able to hear us, maybe we should never stop talking to them.”
― Colleen Hoover, Reminders of Him

“happiness isn’t some permanent thing we’re all trying to achieve in life, it’s merely a thing that shows up every now and then, sometimes in tiny doses that are just substantial enough to keep us going.”
― Colleen Hoover, Reminders of Him

“I could recognize him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world.”
― Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

“And perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone.”
― Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

“In the darkness, two shadows, reaching through the hopeless, heavy dusk. Their hands meet, and light spills in a flood like a hundred golden urns pouring out of the sun.”
― Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

“Name one hero who was happy."
I considered. Heracles went mad and killed his family; Theseus lost his bride and father; Jason's children and new wife were murdered by his old; Bellerophon killed the Chimera but was crippled by the fall from Pegasus' back.
"You can't." He was sitting up now, leaning forward.
"I can't."
"I know. They never let you be famous AND happy." He lifted an eyebrow. "I'll tell you a secret."
"Tell me." I loved it when he was like this.
"I'm going to be the first." He took my palm and held it to his. "Swear it."
"Why me?"
"Because you're the reason. Swear it."
"I swear it," I said, lost in the high color of his cheeks, the flame in his eyes.
"I swear it," he echoed.
We sat like that a moment, hands touching. He grinned.
"I feel like I could eat the world raw.”
― Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

“We were like gods at the dawning of the world, & our joy was so bright we could see nothing else but the other.”
― Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

“I am made of memories.”
― Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

“At some point, you have got to stop worrying so much about what everyone else needs and start thinking about what you need.”
― Lucy Score, Things We Never Got Over

“You’re the one who has to live your life. Don’t apologize to other people for the decisions you make for yourself.”
― Lucy Score, Things We Never Got Over

“You get to decide how you show up in this world. No one else gets to dictate to you who you are,”
― Lucy Score, Things We Never Got Over

“This book is about the bravery it takes for us to love someone when we all know how every love story ends.”
― Lucy Score, Things We Never Got Over