Laurie Halse Anderson Quotes

Momma said that ghosts couldn't move over water. That's why Africans got trapped in the Americas.. They kept moving us over the water, stealing us away from our ghosts and ancestors, who cried salty rivers into the sand. That's where Momma was now, wailing at the water's edge, while her girls were pulled out of sight under white sails that cracked in the wind.

If I can write a book that will help the world make a little more sense to a teen, then that's why I was put on the planet.

We have to acknowledge that adolescence is that time of transition where we begin to introduce to children that life isn't pretty, that there are difficult things, there are hard situations, it's not fair. Bad things happen to good people.

Can the plural possessive express the feelings in your heart? If you don't learn art now, you will never learn to breathe!

It doesn't hurt. Nothing hurts except the small smiles and blushes that flash across the room like tiny sparrows.

The only number that would ever be enough is 0. Zero pounds, zero life, size zero, double-zero, zero point. Zero in tennis is love. I finally get it.

There's no point in asking why, even though everybody will. I know why. The harder question is "why not?" I can't believe she ran out of answers before I did.

She looks like a china doll, observed Grandfather as we departed. I will break just as easily, I muttered.

Gym should be illegal. It's humiliating.

She cannot chain my soul. Yes, she could hurt me. She'd already done so...I would bleed, or not. Scar, or not. Live, or not. But she could not hurt my soul, not unless I gave it to her.

I am angry that I starved my brain and that I sat shivering in my bed at night instead of dancing or reading poetry or eating ice cream or kissing a boy.

I don’t know what I’m doing in the next five minutes and she has the next ten years figured out. I’ll worry about making it out of ninth grade alive. Then I’ll think about a career path.

I was good at digging holes. It was the rest of life I sucked at.

I am learning how to be angry and sad and lonely and joyful and excited and afraid and happy.

Life is for the living. Don't let the fear of striking out let you from keep you from playing the game.

Too much sun after a Syracuse winter does strange things to your head, makes you feel strong, even if you aren't.

They're on their way to the foreign-language wing. That's no surprise. The foreign kids are always here, like they need to breathe air scented with their native language a couple times a day or they'll choke to death on too much American.

It had been a good day, all things considered. I had managed rather well on my own. I opened Grandfather's Bible. This is what it would be like when I had my own shop, or when I traveled abroad. I would always read before sleeping. One day, I'd be so rich I would have a library full of novel to choose from. But I would always end the evening with a Bible passage.

I see IT in the hallway. IT goes to Merryweather. IT is walking with Aubrey cheerleader. IT is my nightmare and I can't wake up.IT sees me. IT smiles and winks. Good thing my lips are stitched together or I'd throw up.

Mr. Freeman sighs. "No imagination. What are you thirteen? Fourteen? You've already let them beat your creativity out of you!

Apologies mean nothing if you don't mean it.

Here stands a girl clutching a knife. There is grease on the stove, blood in the air, and angry words piled in the corners. We are trained not to see it, not to see any of it. . . . Someone just ripped off my eyelids.

I have never heard a more eloquent silence.

Who cares what the color means? How do you know what he meant to say? I mean, did he leave another book called "Symbolism in My Books?" If he didn't, then you could just be making all of this up. Does anyone really think this guy sat down and stuck all kinds of hidden meanings into his story? It's just a story.... But I think you are making all of this symbolism stuff up. I don't believe any of it.

Kids are mostly very resilient.

I see a girl caught in the remains of a holiday gone bad, with her flesh picked off day after day as the carcass dries out. The knife and fork are abviously middle-class sensibilities. The palm tree is a nice touch. A broken dream,perhaps? Plastic honeymoon, deserted island? Oh, If you put in a slice of pumpkin pie, it could be a desserted island! (Pg 64)

Hannah was about to burst with excitement, which would have been disgusting because she would have sprayed blood, guts and glitter in every direction.

What do I want? The answer to that question does not exist.

The best time to talk to ghosts is just before the sun comes up.

I have survived. I am here. Confused, screwed up, but here. So, how can I find my way? Is there a chain saw of the soul, an ax I can take to my memories or fears?

Emma hears me come up the stairs and asks me to watch a movie with her. I stick Band-Aids on my weeping cuts, put on pink pajamas so we match, and snuggle with her under her rainbow comforter. She arranges all of her stuffed animals around us in a circle, everyone facing the TV, then presses play...Ghosts dare not enter here.

Did you read last nights assignments?" Say "yes'" and get hammered again. Say "no'" and the same thing would happen.

A scar is a sign of strength. . .the sign of a survivor.

I knew how much it hurt to be the daughter of people who can't see you, not even if you are standing in front of them stomping your feet.

I inscribe three lines, hush hush hush, into my skin. Ghosts trickle out.