Neal Shusterman citations

“Would you rather die, or be unwound? Now he finally knows the answer. Maybe this is what he wanted. Maybe it's why he stood there and taunted Roland. Because he'd rather be killed with a furious hand than dismembered with cool indifference.”

“What's the point of living if you're going to hate the world? Guard your heart if you have to, but don't shut it away.”

“The moment you're loved, that's when you got your soul.”

“And when the abyss looks into you - and it will - may you look back unflinching.”

“Sure, when you're in the midst of your own suffering, it's easy to convince yourself that you're no good—but we are all tested in this life… The measure of a man is not how much he suffers in the test, but how he comes out at the end.”

“does a sick society get so used to its illness that it can't remember being well? what if the memory is too dangerous for the people who like things the way they are?”

“We move in and out of darkness and light all our lives. Right now I'm pleased to be in the light.”

“Stupid dreams. Even the good ones are bad, because they remind you how poorly reality measures up.”

“In a perfect world everything would be either black or white, right or wrong, and everyone would know the difference. But this isn't a perfect world. The problem is people who think it is.”

“… One thing you learn when you've lived as long as I have-people aren't all good, and people aren't all bad. We move in and out of darkness and light all of our lives. Right now, I'm pleased to be in the light.”

“You see, a conflict always begins with an issue - a difference of opinion, an argument. But by the time it turns into a war, the issue doesn't matter anymore, because now it's about one thing and one thing only: how much each side hates the other.”

“You can't change laws without first changing human nature.'
-Nurse Greta

You can't change human nature without first changing the law.'
-Nurse Yvonne”

“Words don't hurt you." Which is one of the hugest criminal lies perpetrated by adults against children in this world. Because words hurt more than any physical pain.”

“It's funny how a flame can only burn your hand if you move too slow, you can tease it all you want and it never gets you, if your quick enough.”

“I'm scared," he says.
"I know," says the nurse.
"I want you all to go to Hell."
"That's natural.”

“The sad truth about humanity… is that people believe what they're told. Maybe not the first time, but by the hundredth time, the craziest of ideas just becomes a given.”

“Unwinds didn't go out with a bang-they didn't even go out with a whimper. they went out with the silence of a candle flame pinched between two fingers.”

“Looks are deceiving," Risa says. "After all, when I first saw you I thought you looked reasonably intelligent.”

“Getting to know someone in blind darkness changes your impression of them.”

“Fight, flight, and screw up royaly.”

“That's what law is: educated guesses at right and wrong.”

“The measure of a man is not how much he suffers in the test, but how he comes out at the end.”

“What he's really saying is: Please be a human being. With a life so full of rules and regiments, it's so easy to forget that's what they are. She knows—she sees—how often compassion takes a back seat to expediency.”

“Dead kids are put on pedestals, but mentally ill kids get hidden under the rug.”

“Hope can be bruised and battered. It can be forced underground and even rendered unconscious, but hope cannot be killed.”

“Once in a while our school has half days, and the teachers spend the afternoon 'in service,' which I think must be a group therapy for having to deal with us.”

“… the first sign of civilization is always trash.”

“I gotta go to the bathroom," Emby mumbles.
"You should have thought of that before you left," says Hayden, putting on his best mother voice. "How many times do we have to tell you? Always use the potty before climbing into a shipping crate.”

“No true hero ever believes that they are one.”