...people get hurt in rumbles, maybe killed. I'm sick of it because it doesn't do any good. You can't win...even if you whip us. You'll still be where you were before- at the bottom. And we'll still be the lucky ones with all the breaks. So it doesn't do any good, the fighting and the killing. It doesn't prove a thing.

Rat race is the perfect name for it,' she said. 'We're always going and going and going, and never asking where. Did you ever hear of having more than you wanted? So that you couldn't want anything else and then started looking for something else to want? It seems like we're always searching for something to satisfy is, and never finding it. Maybe if we could lose our cool we would.

...I knew he would be dead, because Dally Winston wanted to be dead and he always got what he wanted.

I really do like listening to stuff that's happened to other people. I guess that's why I like to read.

Johnny almost grinned as he nodded. "Tuff enough," he managed, and by the way his eyes were glowing, I figured Southern gentlemen had nothing on Johnny Cade.

Anything you read can influence your work, so I try to read good stuff.

You get tough like me and you don't get hurt. You look out for yourself and nothin' can touch you.