Maggie Stiefvater quotes:

Would we be so enamored with dystopian fiction if we lived in a culture where violent death was a major concern? It wouldn't be escapism.

I really love nature. I grew up in the country. But one of the things about nature is that it is beautiful but it's also very dangerous.

As you learn who you are, you can better surround yourself with friends who make you a better person, and that sometimes only happens when you disassemble old relationships.

I'm a dirt road out in the country kind of person, but I remember thinking, I could live in Chicago.

A novel is a conversation starter, and if the author isn't there for the after-party, both the writer and the reader are missing a lot.

Misty of Chincoteague', 'The Black Stallion', the 'Saddle Club' books, I read 'em all. I was horse-crazy.

I adore book-to-film adaptations when they're done well, and I'm more lenient than many readers when it comes to what counts as 'done well.' For me, the most important thing is that the film maintains the spirit of the original book.

I do all of my good thinking at over 65 miles per hour. The speed limit is, luckily, the same speed as my brainstorming speed.

When I was a child, I was one of the kids who wore black all the time, and when the kids asked me why I wore black, I said things like, 'I'm mourning the death of modern society.' I mean, I was a riot.

When I graduated from college, I went straight to work for a federal contractor, a desk job, and they were great to me, they loved me, I was like their mascot, but I just couldn't stand working in an office. I just hated it. And so one day I went in and said, 'I'm sorry, this is my two-weeks notice, I'm quitting to become an artist.'

I would like to say that I was inspired to write 'Shiver' by some overwhelming belief in true love, but here's my true confession: I wrote 'Shiver' because I like to make people cry.

It's easy to say why I love coming to Chicago for my signings, because I still remember the very first time I came to Chicago, right before 'Shiver' came out. I remember I was so struck by the feel of the city, how wide open it felt, even with these massive buildings all around me. The parks and green spaces are incredible.

I can tell you that as a writer and as a reader, I regard character as king. Or queen. No matter how riveting the action or interesting the plot twists, if I don't feel like I'm meeting someone who feels real, I'm not going to be compelled to read further.

I don't cry at books or movies. Ever. So imagine my shock and awe when I read 'The Time Traveler's Wife' for the second time, and I knew the ending, and I started to cry.

Most people had an acquired kind of beauty, they became better looking the longer you knew them and the better you loved them, but Cole had unfairly skipped to the end of the game, all jaggedly handsome and Hollywood-looking. Not needing any love to get there.

One of the things that I really like about young adult fiction is that you can explore the relationships between teens and their parents. I definitely think that teens are a product of their parents. You either end up just like them or you consciously make the decision to be unlike them.

My parents were very permissive when it came to animals. As long as we earned the money to buy them and built whatever structure it was they were going to live in, we could have any kind of pet we wanted. They would have let us have a rhinoceros if we could have afforded it.

They couldn't hurt Gansey. Nothing could hurt him; people who said money couldn't buy everything hadn't seen anyone as rich as the Aglionby boys. They were untouchable, immune to life's troubles. Only death couldn't be swiped away by a credit card.

This object that we hold in our hands, a book... that tactile pleasure, it's just not going to go away.

I think that whenever a book is not a challenge, I'm telling the wrong story.

Again and Again, however, we know the language of love, and the little churchyard with its lamenting names and the staggeringly secret abyss in which others find their end: again and again the two of us go out under the ancient trees, make our bed again and again between the flowers, face to face with the skies

As you learn who you are, you can better surround yourself with friends who make you a better person, and that sometimes only happens when you disassemble old relationships."

Thery're both iron, isn't that funny?""Funny haha or funny strange?"James handed them back to me "Funny 'occult'""Ah. Funny strange"James looked at me sternly, "Don't start that. I'm supposed to be the humorous one"

I focus on the elements of a movie that are meant to invisibly affect me as a viewer. The edges. As an author, I'm aware of how the subconscious things can pluck at a reader's emotions, and I love it when filmmakers do the same.

My whole life, I had thought that my story was, again and again: Once upon a time, there was a boy, and he had to risk everything to keep what he loved. But really, the story was: Once upon a time, there was a boy, and his fear ate him alive.

He sounded absolutely miserable. Are you ever going to speak to me?

Afterward, Isabel drove me home and I shut myself in the study with Rilke, and I read and I wanted.And leaving you (there arent words to untangle it) Your life, fearful and immense and blossoming, So that, sometimes frustrated, and sometimes understanding Your life is sometimes a stone in you, and then, a starI was beginning to undertand poetry.

And leaving you (there aren't words to untangle it)Your life, fearful and immense and blossoming,so that, sometimes frustrated, and sometimes understanding,Your life is sometimes a stone in you, and then, a star.

His mind was logical, but his traitorous heart stuttered from beat to beat.

As the hours crept by, the afternoon sunlight bleached all the books on the shelves to pale, gilded versions of themselves and warmed the paper and ink inside the covers so that the smell of unread words hung in the air."

My chest ached, my body speaking a language my head didn't quite understand.I waited.But Grace, the only person in the world I wanted to know me, just ran a wanting finger over the cover of one of the new hardcovers and walked out of the store without ever realising I was there, right within reach."

Sam?" Rachel askedDo you know you have the saddest sad face ever?"

I try to think of something catchy to say, but there's nothing but irritation that something that was funny yo an eleven-year-old boy is still funny to a seventeen-year-old one."

He left Chainsaw behind, much to her irritation. Ronan didn't want her to learn any bad language."

Adam had once told Gansey, "Rags to riches isn't a story anyone wants to hear until after it's done.

Adam didn't look at him when he said, finally, "It doesn't matter how you say it. It's what you wanted, in the end. All your things in one place, all under your roof. Everything you own right where you can see...

Being Adam Parrish was a complicated thing, a wonder of muscles and organs, synapses and nerves. He was a miracle of moving parts, a study in survival. The most important thing to Adam Parrish, though, had always been free will, the ability to be his own master. This was the important thing. It had always been the important thing. This was what it was to be Adam.

I guess now would be a good time to tell you," He said. "I took Chainsaw out of my dreams.

Where do you live?" Adam's mouth was very set. "A place made for leaving" "That's not really an answer." "It's not really a place.

It was nothing, but it was Adam Parrish's nothing. How he hated and loved it. How proud he was of it, how wretched it was.

I walk through the seasons and always the birds are singing and screaming and keening for love When you're with me it seems so absurd that I should be jealous of the jay and the dove.

The fact was, by the time she got to high school, being weird and proud of it was an asset. Suddenly cool, Blue could've happily had any number of friends. And she had tried. But the problem with being weird was that everyone else was 'normal'".

Death smells like birthday cake.

As always, there was an all-American war hero look to him, coded in his tousled brown hair, his summer-narrowed hazel eyes, the straight nose that ancient Anglo-Saxons had graciously passed on to him. Everything about him suggested valor and power and a firm handshake.

I feel like I have so many stories basting in my mind, and they come busting out when they're ready.

Calla readjusted, wrapping the silk around her other thigh instead. "Which one's he again? The pretty one?" Blue and Gansey exchanged a look. Blue's look said, I'm so, so sorry. Gansey's said, Am I the pretty one?

I'm very nearly drunk enough to be transcendent," Calla said after a space. She was not the only psychic drinking, but she was the closest one to transcendence. Persephone peered dubiously into the bottom of her own glass. In a very small voice (her voice was always small), she said sadly, "I am not drunk at all." Maura offered, "It's the Russian in you." "Estonian,"Persephone replied.

When does it happen?" "It already has," Calla replied. Her eyes opened and fixed on Blue. "And it hasn't yet. Time' circular, chicken. We use the same parts of it over and over. Some of us more than others.

Then Maura made something with butter and Calla made something with bacon and Blue steamed broccoli in self-defense.

The best-case scenario here is that you make friends with a boy who's going to die." "Ah," said Calla, in a very, very knowing way. "Now I see." "Don't psychoanalyse me," her mother said. "I already have. And I say again, 'ah'.

Maura whirled towards Blue. "Blue, if you ever see that man again, you just walk the other way." "No," Calla corrected. "Kick him in the nuts. Then run the other way.

Gansey turned the key. The engine turned over once, paused for the briefest of moments - and then roared to deafening life. The Camaro lived to fight another day. The radio was even working, playing the Stevie Nicks song that always sounded to Gansey like it was about a one-winged dove.

The inside of the old Camaro smelled like asphalt and desire, gasoline and dreams.

Listen to you sounding all badass. I bet you're just listening to a CD called 'The Sounds of Crime' while you cruise for chicks outside the Old Navy in your Camaro.

Tommy grabs my waist and swings me around in a circle. I drag my feet because i am opposed to people touching me when I'm not expecting it. Also because it will take more than dancing to cheer me up.

I started down but Sam caught my arm and knelt down himself to look. "For crying out loud," he said. "It's a racoon." "Poor thing," I said. "It could be a rabid baby-killer," Cole told me primly. "Shut up," Sam said pleasantly.

Now, I was a fan of the simple pleasures in life: grilled cheese sandwiches without black flecks on the crust, jeans that didn't pinch the better parts of me, an inch of vodka, ten to twelve hours of sleep. - Cole St Clair, Forever.

You'll have to go commando." "Is there any other way?

I'm pleased to see that the cab is cluttered with cough drop wrappers and empty milk bottles and bits of mud-smeared newspapers made brittle by age. Neatness makes me feel like I have to be on my best behavior. Clutter is my natural habitat.

My wolf was a cute guy and he was holding my hand. I could die happy.

Grace," I said, my vision swirling now because of her blood smeared across my wrists, "Can you hear me?" She nodded then stumbled to her knees. I knelt beside her; her eyes were huge and afraid and my heart was breaking. "I'll come find you, I said. "I promise I'll come find you. Don't forget me. Don't-don't lose yourself.

We are shoulder to shoulder due to the size of the cab, and if Gratton is made of flour and potatoes, Sean is made of stone and driftwood and possibly those prickly anemones that sometimes wash up on shore.

Creative" "Dangerously emo.

sensitive," I tried. Sam translated, "squishy." "creative." "Dangerously Emo." "thoughtful." Feng shui.

Gansey appeared beside Blue in the doorway. He shook his empty bottle at her. "Fair trade," he told her in a way that indicated he had selected a fair-trade coffee beverage entirely so that he could tell Blue that he had selected a fair-trade coffee beverage so that she could tell him well done with your carbon footprint and all that jazz. Blue said, "Better recycle that bottle.

Many, many readers have written asking me wistfully about the nature of Sam and Grace's relationship, and I can assure you, that sort is absolutely real. Mutual, respectful, enduring love is completely attainable as long as you swear you won't settle for less.

Mutual, respectful, enduring love is completely attainable as long as you swear you won't settle for less.

The place smelled like Sam -- or, I guess, he smelled like the store. Like ink and old building and something more leafy than coffee but less interesting than weed. It was all very ... erudite. I felt surrounded by conversations I had no interest in participating in.

One happy day for every falling leaf you catch. Sam's voice was low.

Did you know you get one happy day for every one you catch?... One happy day for every falling leaf you catch" -sam

This new world was a vicious, sleek world made of street lights and tight jeans, sharp smiles and fast cars. This was a city, edited. A city, pared down to its bare minimums, beautiful and abusive.

How do you get 'feng shui' out of 'thoughtful'?

I found it." "People find pennies," Gansey replied. "Or car keys. Or four-leaf clovers." "And ravens," Ronan said. "You're just jealous 'cause" - at this point, he had to stop to regroup his beer-sluggish thoughts - "you didn't find one, too.

Crashing into the trembling void Stretching my hand to you Losing myself to frigid regret Is this fragile love A way To say Good-bye

While I'm gone," Gansey said, pausing, "dream me the world. Something new for every night.

All that mattered was that something had struck the match, and Gansey was burning.

Gansey had once told Adam that he was afraid most people didn't know how to handle Ronan. What he meant by this was that he was worried that one day someone would fall on Ronan and cut themselves.

We have to be back in three hours', Ronan said. 'I just fed Chainsaw but she'll need it again.' 'This', Gansey replied, 'is precisely why I didn't want to have a baby with you.

You are being self-pitying." "I'm nearly done. You don't have much more of this to bear." "I like you better this way." "Crushed and broken," Gansey said. "Just the way women like 'em.

I wish you could be kissed, Jane,' he said. 'Because I would beg just one off you. Under all this.' He flailed an arm toward the stars.

I think they're here because I thought they ought to be here," Gansey said. Blue replied sarcastically. "Okay, God.

In the end, he was nobody to Adam, he was nobody to Ronan. Adam spit his words back at him and Ronan squandered however many second chances he gave him. Gansey was just a guy with a lot of stuff and a hole inside him that chewed away more of his heart every year.

When Gansey was polite, it made him powerful. When Adam was polite, he was giving power away.

They were always walking away from him. But he never seemed able to walk away from them.

I have to walk dogs." "Oh," Gansey replied, sounding deflated. "Well, okay." "But it'll only take an hour." "Oh," he repeated, about fourteen shades brighter. "Shall I pick you up, then?

I like you better this way." For some reason, admitting this made her face go hot right away; she was very glad that he still had his face pressed into his pillow and the other boys were still in Noah's room. "Crushed and broken," Gansey said. "Just the way women like 'em.

Blue tried not to look at Gansey's boat shoes; she felt better about him as a person if she pretended he wasn't wearing them.

The way Gansey saw it was this: if you had a special knack for finding things, it meant you owed the world to look.

Is that all?" she whispered. Gansey closed his eyes. "That's all there is.

When Ronan thought of Gansey, he thought of moving into Monmouth Manufacturing, of nights spent in companionable insomnia, of a summer searching for a king, of Gansey asking the Gray Man for his life. Brothers.

I thought I heard---" Gansey broke off. His eyes dropped to where Adam held Blue's hand. Again his face was somewhat puzzled by the fact of their hand-holding. Adam's grip tightened, although she didn't think he meant for it to.

I never taught him to break him thumb." "That's Gansey for you. Only learns enough to be superficially competent." "Loser," Ronan agreed, and he was himself again.

Is this thing safe?" "Safe as life," Gansey replied.

He strode over to the ruined church. This, Blue had discovered, was how Gansey got places - striding. Walking was for ordinary people.

He's a pit bull," Adam said. "I know some really nice pit bulls." "He's the kind of pit that makes the evening news. Gansey's trying to restrain him." "How noble.

Sam- " After you were bitten, i knew what would happen. I waited for you to change, every night, so i could bring you back and keep you from getting hurt." Grace- " How long did you wait?" Sam- " I haven't stopped.

Gift of time in me enclosed the future suddenly exposed

My father said once that if I didn't have my mother's ginger hair, I wouldn't blush or curse as easily. Which I though was unfair. I hardly ever curse or blush, even though I've had plenty of days that required both.

The walls of the arch are covered with blood-red jellies that wink and glisten at me by the light of the moon. My father told me they were completely harmless. I don't believe him. Nothing is completely harmless.

Cole made a hissing sound. "Are you inside yet? God bless America and all her sons. What is taking you so long?" The front door was locked. "Here, talk to Grace" "Mommy isn't going to give a different answer than Daddy," Cole said, but I handed her the phone anyway.

I never knew there were so many different ways to say good-bye.

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Grace Brisbane. There was nothing particularly special about her, except that she was good with numbers, and very good at lying, and she made her home in between the pages of books. She loved all the wolves behind her house, but she love one of them most of all.

What do you mean? Grace Brisbane, you do not mean that you're not going back home again. Tell me that this was just because you were momentarily angry at them for grounding you. Or even tell me it's because you could not live without The Boy's stunning Boyfruits for another night. But don't tell me you think it's forever!

Thery're both iron, isn't that funny?" "Funny haha or funny strange?" James handed them back to me "Funny 'occult'" "Ah. Funny strange" James looked at me sternly, "Don't start that. I'm supposed to be the humorous one

It's a hard thing to hold a civil conversation after recalling that one party has used a Taser on the other, so both of them finished the walk in silence.

His heart hurt with the wanting of it, the hurt no less painful for being difficult to explain.

It's very ugly' I said generously. 'But it looks as though it would laugh at snow. And, if you hit a deer it would hiccup, and keep going.

And then I did laugh, even though the future was a dangerous place, because I loved her, and she loved me, and the world was beautiful.

How long?" His smile was amazingly sweet. "The longest." For ever?" Sam's lips smiled, but above his grin, his yellow eyes turned sad, as if he knew it was a lie. "Longer.

She kissed me harder, breath huffing into my mouth, and bit my lip. Oh, hell that was amazing. I growled before I could stop myself.

I loved you so much right then Sam Roth.

You know what I mean. I'm telling you I was stupid over it. I thought it was about trying so hard to survive that you didn't have the time to be a good parent. Obviously, that's not it. Because you and I, we're both...wealthy in love.

Sleep deprivation made his life an imaginary thing, his days a ribbon floating aimlessly in water." - Whelk

the intermittent breeze carried her scent to me again and again , singing in another language of memories from another form .

Are there any other missing persons living under your roof? Elvis? Jimmy Hoffa? Amelia Earhart? I'd just like full disclosure now, before we go any further.

Eleanor's voice was below zero. 'My finest horse to whichever faerie in this room brings me that woman's left eye.' My thoughts exactly.

The world needs more love at first sight.

Kissing in front of the loveless is an act of cruelty.

A frightening menagerie, my emotions are Too many and varied to number Like creatures they crawl and they fly above Tearing my body asunder.

It was possible that I'd thrown one too many Molotov cocktails over God's fence.