Tris, “Divergent” trilogy by Veronica Roth
“Becoming fearless isn’t the point. That’s impossible. It’s learning how to control your fear, and how to be free from it.”
“People, I have discovered, are layers and layers of secrets. You believe you know them, that you understand them, but their motives are always hidden from you, buried in their own hearts. You will never know them, but sometimes you decide to trust them.”
“I fell in love with him. But I don’t just stay with him by default as if there’s no one else available to me. I stay with him because I choose to, every day that I wake up, every day that we fight or lie to each other or disappoint.”
“I am too strong to break so easily, and I become better, sharper, every time I touch him.”
Celaena, “Throne of Glass” series by Sarah J. Maas
“My name is Celaena Sardothien. But it makes no difference if my name’s Celaena or Lillian or Bitch, because I’d still beat you, no matter what you call me.”
“The rest of the world quieted into nothing. In that moment, after ten long years, Celaena looked at Chaol and realised she was home.”
“My name is Celaena Sardothien” she whispered “And I will not be afraid.”
Isaboe and Quintana, “Lumatere Chronicles” by Melina Marchetta
“Let me tell you about your bride,” she said, propping herself up on her elbows. “Both of you would cultivate the land. You would hold the plow, and she would walk alongside you with the ox, coaxing and singing it forward. A stick in her hand, of course, for she would need to keep both the ox and you in line.”
“Be prepared for the worst, my love, for it lives next door to the best.”
——-
“‘Oh, you’re one of those,’ the princess said.
‘One of what?’
‘One of those who needs to be told their worth over and over by others. Do you know who tells me my worth, Phaedra of Alonso?’
The princess pointed a hard finger at her own chest.
‘Me. I determine my own worth. If I had to rely on others I’d have lain down and died waiting.”
Karou, “Daughter of Smoke and Bone” series by Laini Taylor
Better to be the cat gazing coolly down from a high wall, its expression inscrutable. The cat that shunned petting, that needed no one. Why couldn’t she be that cat?
Be that cat!!! she wrote, drawing it into the corner of her page, cool and aloof.”“And yet, something tied them together, strong than any of that, something with the power to conduct her blood and breath like a symphony, so that anything she did to fight against it felt like discord, like disharmony with her self.”
Tessa, “The Infernal Devices” trilogy by Cassandra Clare
“They say you cannot love two people equally at once,” she said. “And perhaps for others that is so. But you and Will—you are not like two ordinary people, two people who might have been jealous of each other, or who would have imagined my love for one of them diminished by my love of the other. You merged your souls when you were both children. I could not have loved Will so much if I had not loved you as well. And I could not love you as I do if I had not loved Will as I did.”
“She had never imagined she had the power to make someone else so happy. And not a magical power, either–a purely human one.”
Cassie, “The 5th Wave” by Rick Yancey
“But if I’m it, the last of my kind, the last page of human history, like hell I’m going to let the story end this way. I may be the last one, but I am the one still standing. I am the one turning to face the faceless hunter in the woods on an abandoned highway. I am the one not running but facing. Because if I am the last one, then I am humanity. And if this is humanity’s last war, then I am the battlefield.”
“When I cry – when I let myself cry – that’s who I cry for. I don’t cry for myself. I cry for the Cassie that’s gone.
And I wonder what that Cassie would think of me.
The Cassie who kills.”
Alina, the “Grisha” series by Leigh Bardugo
“The moment our lips met, I knew with pure and piercing certainty that I would have waited for him forever.”
“So many men had tried to make her a queen. Now she understood that she was meant for something more. The Darkling had told her he was destined to rule. He had claimed his throne, and a part of her too. He was welcome to it. For the living and the dead, she would make herself a reckoning. She would rise.”
“I have loved you all my life, Mal,” I whispered through my tears. “There is no end to our story.”
Hermione from The Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling
“Are you sure that’s a real spell? Well, it’s not very good is it? I’ve tried a few simple spells myself and they’ve all worked for me. Nobody in my family’s magic at all, it was ever such a surprise when I got my letter, but I was ever so pleased, of course, it’s the best school of witchcraft there is I’ve heard – I’ve learned all the course books by heart of course. I just hope it will be enough – I’m Hermione Granger, by the way, who are you?”
“One person couldn’t feel all that, they’d explode!” said Ron.
“Just because you’ve got the emotional range of a teaspoon doesn’t mean we all have,” said Hermione.”
Viola, the “Chaos Walking” trilogy by Patrick Ness
“He looks up and the loss in his Noise is so great it feels like I’m standing on the edge of an abyss, that I’m about to fall down into him, into blackness so empty and lonely there’d never be a way out.
“Todd,” I say again, a catch in my voice. “On the ledge, under the waterfall, do you remember what you said to me? Do you remember what you said to save me?”
He’s shaking his head slowly. “I’ve done terrible things, Viola. Terrible things-”
“We all fall, you said.” I’m gripping his hand now. “We all fall but that’s not what matters. What matters is picking yourself up again”“But what he’s forgetting,” she says. “What he’s forgotting is that me and Todd, we ran halfway across this planet together, by ourselves. We beat his craziest preacher. We outran an entire army and survived being shot and beaten and chased and we bloody well stayed alive this whole time without being blown up or tortured to death or dying in battle or anything.”
She takes her hand of Lee so she’s balancing just against me.
“Me and Todd? Together against the Mayor?” She smiles. “He doesn’t stand a chance.”
Yes yes yes! Soooooo many great heroines here, and it’s great to remember them through these awesome quotes.
(In fairness, Phaedra is pretty awesome herself. Just in a very different way from either Quintana or Isaboe. That’s one of Marchetta’s strengths, though: Everyone gets to shine in their own unique way.)
Totally agree — Phaedra is awesome, and her storyline with Lucian was my favorite in the final book, since it was the only one I wasn’t completely certain would turn out OK!
I am so happy to see Celeana on there, especially since I just finished the 2nd book and those characters are still floating around in my head.
I had forgotten how much I liked Karou. I need to catch up on that series.
I’ve been known to lay awake at night and wonder if I would be able to be as strong as Cassie is in the 5th Wave. Could I do it?
This comment made me so happy. I love that you are willing to read my favorites 🙂 Girl, I have a book to send you. Will email you.
Yay!