Top 140 Helen Hoang Quotes (2026 Update)
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51. “His sisters had posters of Henney plastered all over their bedroom walls, had even established a man-beauty scale of one to Henney.”

— Helen Hoang

52. “He matters more to me than the voices in my head.”

— Helen Hoang

53. “I have trouble focusing enough to read anything of significant length, so I find my way to poetry.”

— Helen Hoang

54. “The thing with feelings is they pass. Hearts aren’t designed to feel anything too intensely for too long, be it joy, sorrow, or anger. Everything passes in time. All colors fade.”

— Helen Hoang

55. “When she died, demons were going to torment her for eternity instead of letting her reincarnate. Or worse, they’d let her reincarnate, but she’d be a catfish who lived under a river outhouse. It was only fair. That was what she got for wishing food poisoning on people.”

— Helen Hoang

56. “She still shared a bed with him, but she kept her back to him and balanced on the very edge, as far away from him as possible. Sometimes, he worried she’d fall off. Other times, he hoped she’d fall off. So he’d have an excuse to tell her to come closer.”

— Helen Hoang

57. “I’m thinking I need to switch apps or narrow my search criteria when I come across Anna. Her picture is so sweet that I almost skip her on principle, but I keep looking because I can’t help myself.”

— Helen Hoang

58. “I don’t care what these hands do as long as they’re yours.”

— Helen Hoang

59. “You’re wet already, Stella. You’re like a Lamborghini. Zero to sixty in two point seven seconds.”

— Helen Hoang

60. “That’s when I realize that I trust him. Over the past weeks, he’s proven time and again that he respects me, that he won’t hurt me. I can tell him things. Not because he doesn’t matter. But because he is kind.”

— Helen Hoang

61. “All I can do is go forward, and to do that, I must stop chasing perfection. It doesn’t exist. I can never please everyone. It’s hard enough just pleasing myself. Instead, I must focus on giving what I have, not what people want, because that is all I can give.”

— Helen Hoang

62. “Sometimes he was alone out of habit. Sometimes it took effort to distract himself from the growing emptiness inside.”

— Helen Hoang

63. “I don’t like it when people have to act differently for me.”

— Helen Hoang

64. “This yearning for her, this craving, it’s sunk so deep into me that it’s part of me now. This is how Quan is now. He’s crazy about this one girl.”

— Helen Hoang

65. “So beautiful. And here. She’d come to find him again. No one ever looked for him. They all knew he wanted to be alone. Except it wasn’t always that way. Sometimes he was alone out of habit. Sometimes it took effort to distract himself from the growing emptiness inside.”

— Helen Hoang

66. “They’d tell me to quit indulging myself and snap out of it. Tough love is our way. Being tough on myself isn’t working now, though. I can’t try harder than I already am.”

— Helen Hoang

67. “Anna’s pain is real. I can’t brush it aside just because I don’t understand it. I can’t place judgment on it. Pain is pain.”

— Helen Hoang

68. “For that’s the only place where true perfection exists – the blank page. Nothing I actually do can compete with the boundless potential of what I could do.”

— Helen Hoang

69. “Lips to lips, hearts melting together, no distance between them, not even an arm’s length.”

— Helen Hoang

70. “No one seemed to understand it wasn’t good-bye unless Andy said it back.”

— Helen Hoang

71. “Her lips curved like she was telling him a secret. About math things.”

— Helen Hoang

72. “She didn’t need to sleep with him. Her anger would keep her company.”

— Helen Hoang

73. “She was a bloodthirsty villainess.”

— Helen Hoang

74. “She ached so badly to be held it felt like a sickness had invaded her muscles and bones.”

— Helen Hoang

75. “He exhaled sharply, and his brow creased in puzzlement. “You don’t like French kissing?” “It makes me feel like a shark getting its teeth cleaned by pilot fish.” It was weird and far too personal.”

— Helen Hoang

76. “The length of an arm? That’s a strange saying. And so lonely.”

— Helen Hoang

77. “I walk home in a sort of trance. It’s not until passing pedestrians give me double takes and odd looks that I realize I’m crying. I don’t try to stop. I let the tears fall. I cry for the girl I used to be. I cry for me. It’s a foreign experience. Self-pity is not an indulgence that I allow myself. This doesn’t feel like pity, though. It feels like self-compassion, and the realization makes me cry harder. No one should need a diagnosis in order to be compassionate to themself.”

— Helen Hoang

78. “No one should need a diagnosis in order to be compassionate to themself.”

— Helen Hoang

79. “Don’t forget to apologize. First with words. Then with your tongue.”

— Helen Hoang

80. “I don’t life that Priscilla blaming herself when she did all that she could, all that anyone could, really. But I guess that’s how it must be when someone’s standards are so impossibly high and their capacity for empathy so limited. They are cruel to others, and cruelest to themselves.”

— Helen Hoang

81. “Her heart jumped with giddiness, and she ran to him. He closed his arms around her immediately.”

— Helen Hoang

82. “She was so beautiful she made his chest hurt.”

— Helen Hoang

83. “Do you always say exactly what you’re thinking?” “Either that or I don’t talk.”

— Helen Hoang

84. “Smiles are real when they reach your eyes.”

— Helen Hoang

85. “She ached so badly to be held it felt like a sickness had invaded her muscles and bones. As usual, her own arms provided little comfort.”

— Helen Hoang

86. “I wasn’t loneliness if it could be eradicated with work or a Netflix marathon or a good book. Real loneliness would stick with you all the time. Real loneliness would hurt you nonstop.”

— Helen Hoang

87. “It’s economics.”

— Helen Hoang

88. “Your body wages biological warfare on me.”

— Helen Hoang

89. “I hate his smile for how much I like it. I know it’s illogical, I know it’s cowardly. But I back away from him farther, shaking my head.”

— Helen Hoang

90. “What would he think if she told him how difficult it was for her to do things like dancing and drinking? Going out was supposed to be fun. For her, it was work – hard work.”

— Helen Hoang

91. “Sometimes, he worried she’d fall off. Other times, he hoped she’d fall off. So he’d have an excuse to tell her to come closer.”

— Helen Hoang

92. “All I’ve got at this point is me. I have to be enough.”

— Helen Hoang

93. “For whatever reason, none of the women in this house cooked. He’d had to learn in order to survive.”

— Helen Hoang

94. “He’d been made to love her.”

— Helen Hoang

95. “When you loved something, you were good at it. If you weren’t good right away, you got good at it.”

— Helen Hoang

96. “She had a disorder, but it didn’t define her.”

— Helen Hoang

97. “He got out of bed and pulled on his jeans, fully aware of her audience’s appreciative gaze. He felt a little ridiculous about it, but maybe he did it slowly. Maybe he flexed his abs and biceps as he zipped his fly and buttoned his pants. Because really, putting on pants required a lot of muscle.”

— Helen Hoang

98. “When he finally found the strength to pull away, he settled her on her feet and went to toss the condom in the toilet.”

— Helen Hoang

99. “This was what happened when you kept secrets. People drew their own conclusions.”

— Helen Hoang

100. “How did you change your life when you were trapped like this? Her history didn’t define her. Her origins didn’t define her. At least, they shouldn’t. She could be more, if she had a chance.”

— Helen Hoang