Lauren⁷ 💜 > Recent Status Updates

I was watching the Grammy’s & I saw the short trailer for Ready Player One and doggone if it didn’t catch my attention. I watched the full trailer on YouTube and I downloaded the free Kindle sample and devoured it and I immediately bought the Kindle edition as soon as I was finished with the sample. Do you know how rare that is? I basically never buy books. I get them all from the library. But that sample hooked me!

But, Gus, my love, I cannot tell you how thankful I am for our little infinity. I wouldn't trade it for the world. You gave me a forever within the numbered days, and I'm grateful.

Oh, I wouldn't mind, Hazel Grace. It would be a privilege to have my heart broken by you.

As he read, I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once.

I could not have loved Will so much if I had not loved you as well. And I could not love you as I do if I had not loved Will as I did.
-Tessa. I have been crying throughout the epilogue. It's so beautiful and heart wrenching!

I recall what you said to me once, that words have the power to change us. Your words have changed me, Tess; they have made me a better man than I would have been otherwise. Life is a book, and there are a thousand pages I have not yet read. I would read them together with you, as many as I can, before I die.
-Will.

You are unique in the world, just as you are unique in my heart, and there will never be a time when I do not love you.
-Will to Tessa.

Truly? You have come back from death like the ghost of Old Marley, but to nag me about my romantic prospects?
-Will. Have I mentioned how much I love Will's wit and sarcasm?

Tess, Tess, Tessa.
Was there ever a more beautiful sound than your name? To speak it aloud makes my heart ring like a bell. Strange to imagine that, isn't it-----a heart ringing? But when you touch me, that is what it is like, as if my heart was ringing in my chest and the sound shivers down my veins and splinters by bones with joy.
-Will.

Every meeting lead to a parting, and so it would, as long as life was mortal. In every meeting there was some of the sorrow of parting, but in every parting there was some of the joy of meeting as well.
-Will.

Then that is a miracle. And one does not question miracles, or complain that they are not constructed perfectly to one's liking.
-Tessa.

Some secrets she thought, where better told; some were better left the burden of the carrier, that they might not cause pain to others.
-Tessa.

It was a near incomprehensible tangle, the three of them, but there was one certainty, and that was that there was no lack of love between them.
-Will. That is a strikingly accurate description of Will, Tessa, and Jem.

Oh. My. Golly!

Holy smokes!!!!

There are so many things worse than death. Not to be loved or not to be able to love: that is worse.
-Will.

Don't you see, Will? You're a person like me. You are like me. You say the things I think but never say outloud. You read the books I read. You love the poetry I love. You make me laugh with your ridiculous songs & the way you see the truth of everything. I feel like you can look inside me & see all the places I am odd or unusual & fit your heart around them, for you are odd & unusual in just the same way.
-Tessa.

Life was an uncertain thing, and there where some moments one wished to remember, to imprint upon one's mind that the memory that might be taken out later, like a flower pressed between the pages of a book, and admired and recollected anew.-Sophie. This quote makes me think of the beautiful Elvis Presley song "Memories." It fits the quote perfectly.

Despite all Cecily's words, he had not felt the connection in him until now. Breathing Welsh air, seeing the Welsh colors: the green of hills, gray of slate and sky, the pallor of whitewashed stone houses, the ivory dots of sheep against the grass. Pine and oak trees were dark emerald in the distance, higher up but closer to the road the vegetation grew green-gray and ochre.-Will.

Oh. My. Gosh. She went there. I didn't think she would.

There must always be a first. It is not easy to be first, and it is not always rewarding, but it is important.
-Jem to Charlotte.
Those are very true and wise words!

And in addition to its practical uses, it would seem to work for cosmetic purposes. This powder would make my very skin glimmer for eternity.
-Magnus. So that's when and how Magnus' obsession with glitter began!

I love her enough that when she assured me that she would be happy with you, I swore to myself I would never speak of my desires again, never indicate my regard by word or by gesture, never by action or speech violate her happiness. My feelings have not changed, and yet I care enough for her and for you that I would not say a word to threaten what you have found. Will to Jem. That is agape love at its very best.

I would give you everything of myself, I would give you more in two weeks than most men would give you in a lifetime. Jem to Tessa.

It was as if he had taken his bow and used it as a paintbrush, creating a canvas upon which his soul was clearly displayed. Tessa.

Perhaps, but you would not exist without a woman, would you? However little use you may find us, we are cleverer and more determined and more patient than men. Men may be stronger, but it is women who endure. Tessa to Woolsey.

Her every smile divided his heart as lightning might split a blackened tree, as did her every look of sorrow.

Forsooth, I no longer toil in vain,
To prove that demon pox warps the brain,
So though 'tis pity, it's not in vain
That the pox-ridden worm:
For to believe in me, you all must deign.
Some truly awful and hilarious poetry from Will. A nice bit of levity given the circumstances.

You know that feeling, when you are reading a book and know that it is going to be a tragedy; you feel the cold and darkness coming, see the net closing around the characters who live and breathe on the pages. But you are tied to the story as if being dragged behind a carriage, and you cannot let go or turn the course aside.-Tessa.

"Amazing, isn't it? The human body, so frail, yet so efficiently put together. A study in contradictions."-Falco. "Yes, amazing. I feel the same way about the whole world sometimes. People seem simultaneous weak & resilient. Life can be cruel, and yet it is full of hope too."-Cass. I'm quite enjoying this book. And I've been listening to a baroque music playlist whilst reading. It really helps bring the book to life.