Patrick Ness Quotes

Men do monstrous things but if you call a man a monster you have absolved yourself of blame. You don't have to think that you might ever do these things. I don't think that's true

To say you have no choice is to relieve yourself of responsibility.

Here is the boy, drowning.

Cept for Ben, who I can’t describe much further without seeming soft and stupid and like a boy, so I won’t, just to say that I never knew my pa, but if you woke up one day and had a choice of picking one from a selecshun, if someone said, here, then, boy, pick who you want, then Ben wouldn’t be the worst choice you could make that morning.

...the lesson of forever and ever is that knowing a man's mind ain't knowing the man.

And I look at her sitting there and she looks across the river and we wait as the dawn fully arrives, each of us knowing. Each of us knowing the other.

Francia don’t look too convinced. I never seen arms so crossed.

Girls are small and polite and smiley. They wear dresses and their hair is long and it’s pulled into shapes behind their heads or on either side.

A man is capable of thought. A crowd is not.

No one ever seems to wonder what happens if it turns out we hate living on a planet? What if the sky’s too big? What if the air stinks? What if we go hungry?’ ‘And what if the air tastes of honey? What if there’s so much food we all get too fat? What if the sky is so beautiful we don’t get any work done because we’re all looking at it too much?

Without a filter, a man is just chaos walking.

And too much informayshun can drive a man mad. Too much informayshun becomes just Noise. And it never, never stops.

Ah, well, then you've never stood on a beach as the waves came crashing in, the water stretching out from you until it's beyond sight, moving and blue and alive and so much bigger than even the black beyond seems because the ocean hides what it contains.

And changing for the better doesn't mean that he's ever going to reach good.

You tell a man the truth about himself and, well, they find they have trouble accepting it.

Knowledge is dangerous." ~pg 53

Why can't we learn to live with how we are? And whatever anybody chooses is okay by the rest of us?

I remember the ache I used to feel when she got too close, how it felt like grief, how it felt like a loss, like I was falling, falling into nothing, how it clenched me up and made me want to weep, made me actually weep.

"You can eff off, too," I say, except I don't say eff, I say what 'eff' stands for.

Do you not wonder sometimes, she showed now, sadly, if in some ways they are correct? That we are asking too much of the world?"No," he said. "They're the ones who are asking for too little."

Stories are important...They can be more important than anything. If they carry the truth.

So we forgive each other?" The crooked smile climbs up one more time. "Again?" And I look right into his eyes, right into him as far as I can see, because I want him to hear me, I want him to hear me with everything I mean and feel and say. "Always," I say to him. "Every time.

And it’s a sad song, Todd, but it’s also a promise. I’ll never deceive you and I’ll never leave you and I promise you this so you can one day promise it to others and know that it’s true.

You do not write your life with words...You write it with actions. What you think is not important. It is only important what you do.

It is a true story, the monster said. Many things that are true feel like a cheat.

This is how we are protecting you, by getting you out.

We have to lie to ourselves to live. Otherwise, we'd go crazy.

There's hope at the bottom of the biggest waterfall." ~pg 426

I don’t know what’s ahead,” I say. “I don’t know nothing about nothing but whatever it is, it’s gotta be better than what’s behind. It’s gotta be.

I was just trying to stay alive, looking for ways to find you, hoping you hadn't left me behind." "Never," I say. "Not never." He looks back up at me. "I'd never leave you neither." "You promise?" "Cross my heart, hope to die," he says, grinning shyly. "I promise, too," I say and I smile at him. "I ain't never leaving you, Todd Hewitt, not never again.

Sometimes witches merit saving. Quite often, actually. You'd be surprised.

The green things of this world are just wondrous, aren’t they?” his mother went on. “We work so hard to get rid of them when sometimes they’re the very thing that saves us.

Limitations can be hugely creative and hugely inspiring - so long as they are the ones you choose for yourself.

Knowledge is dangerous and men lie and the world changes, whether I want it to or not.

He was still alive. Which was the worst thing that could have happened.

And I know I’ve lost. Everything is lost. Everything is over. “As the newly appointed President of this fair planet of ours,” the Mayor says, holding out his hands as if to show me the world for the first time,” let me be the very first to welcome you to its new capital city.” “Todd?” Viola whispers, her eyes closed. I hold her tightly to me. “I’m sorry,” I whisper to her. “I’m so sorry.” We’ve run right into a trap. We’ve run right off the end of the world. “Welcome,” says the Mayor,” to the New Prentisstown.

The first thing you find out when yer dog learns to talk is that dogs don't got nothing much to say. About anything. "Need a poo, Todd." "Shutup, Manchee." "Poo. Poo, Todd." "I said shut it."

You love him," he says. Not an asking, just a fact. "I do," I say. Also a fact.

Viola blows out a thoughtful air. "My dad used to say, 'There's only forward, Vi, only outward and up.'" "There's only forward," I repeat. "Outward and up," she says.

I promised to keep on going but maybe keep on going means coming back first.

We can save the world," I say, trying to smile. "You and me.

It's always darkest before the dawn, Todd.” I look at him, baffled. “No, it ain't! What kinda stupid saying is that? It's always lightest before the dawn!

We run down the right fork, Manchee at our heels, the night and a dusty road stretching out in front of us, an army and a disaster behind us, me and Viola, running side by side.

It's not how we fall. It's how we get back up again.

Just cuz yer going there and I'm staying here," I say. "It don't mean we're parting." "No," she says and I know she understands. "No, it certainly doesn't." "I ain't parting from you again," I say, still looking at our fingers. "Not even in my head.

Choices may be unbelievably hard but they're never impossible. To say you have no choice is to release yourself from responsibility and that's not how a person with integrity acts.

I was only following orders," the Mayor mocks. "The refuge of scoundrels since the dawn of time.

Because he KNEW he was doing wrong. He felt the PAIN of his actions'-- 'But he did not amen them,' shows the Sky. 'The rest are worth as much as their pack animals,' I show, 'but worst is the one who knows better and does NOTHING.