Top 350 Laurie Halse Anderson Quotes (2025 Update)
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301. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. Art is about making mistakes and learning from them.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

302. “The yellow sun rose, a giant balloon filled with prayers and hopes and promise.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

303. “I stand on the edge of a cliff, wondering if I’m going to fall or jump.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

304. “Mostly I watch the scary movies playing on the inside of my eyelids.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

305. “There is a beast in my gut, I can hear it scraping away at the inside of my ribs.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

306. “It takes more to scare me now.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

307. “It is a pretend question, one he asked so he could give the answer. I relax. This is like when my father complains about his boss. The best thing to do is to stay awake and blink sympathetically.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

308. “But they are so cute. And they cheer on our boys, inciting them to violence and, we hope, victory. These are our role models – the Girls Who Have It All. I bet none of them ever stutter or screw up or feel like their brains are dissolving into marshmallow fluff. They all have beautiful lips, carefully out- lined in red and polished to a shine.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

309. “She’s packing at least five grand worth of orthodontia, but has great shoes.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

310. “I hide in the bathroom until I know Heather’s bus has left. The salt in my tears feels good when it stings my lips. I wash my face in the sink until there is nothing left of it, no eyes, no nose, no mouth. A slick nothing.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

311. “I have survived. I am here.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

312. “It’s all about SYMBOLISM, says Hairwoman. Every word chosen by Nathaniel, every comma, every paragraph break – these were all done on purpose. To get a decent grade in her class, we have to figure out what he was really trying to say. Why couldn’t he just say what he meant? Would they pin scarlet letters on his chest? B for blunt, S for straightforward?”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

313. “Keep breathing. It took a few minutes but I won. The grey pulled away from my eyes in ribbons and whispered that it would be back soon.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

314. “It is screwed to the wall, so I cover it with a poster of Maya Angelou that the librarian gave me. She said Mrs. Angelou is one of the greatest American writers. The poster was coming down because the school board banned on of her books. She must be a great writer if the school board is afraid of her.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

315. “I don’t know what I’m doing in the next five minutes and she has the next ten years figured out.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

316. “They herd us into an assembly that is supposed to be a ‘democratic forum’ to come up with a new school mascot. Who are we? We can’t be the Buccaneers because pirates supported violence and discrimination against women. The kid who suggests the Shoemakers in honor of the old moccasin factory is laughed out of the auditorium. Warriors insults Native Americans. I think Overbearing Eurocentric Patriarchs would be perfect, but I don’t suggest it.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

317. “Words are hard work. I hope they send Hairwoman to a conference or something. I’m ready to help pay for a sub.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

318. “S for silent, for stupid, for scared. S for silly. For shame.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

319. “A fat white seed sleeps in the sky.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

320. “When we get off the bus on Valentine’s Day, a girl with white-blond hair bursts into tears. ‘I Love You, Anjela!’ is spray-painted into the snowbank along the parking lot. I don’t know if Angela is crying because she is happy or because her heart’s desire can’t spell. Her honey is waiting with a red rose. They kiss right there in front of everybody. Happy Valentine’s Day.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

321. “They only want to hear that you’re healing, you’re in recovery, taking it one day at a time. If you’re locked into sick, you should stop wasting their time and just get dead.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

322. “Of course I want to be a model. I want to paint my eyelids gold. I saw that on a magazine cover and it looked amazing – turned the model into a sexy alien that everyone would look at but nobody dared touch.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

323. “Every single day, someone asks Mr. Stetman why we have to learn algebra. You can tell this causes him great personal pain. Mr. Stetman loves algebra. He is poetic about it, in an integral-number sort of way. He talks about algebra the way some guys talk about their cars. Ask him why algebra and he launches into a thousand and one stories why algebra. None of them makes sense.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

324. “It means, ‘You are my heart.’” I leaned forward, took her hands in mine, and whispered into her ear. “You have always been my heart, Country.” Before I could kiss her, Isabel kissed me.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

325. “We are studying American history for the ninth time in nine years. Another review of map skills, one week of Native Americans, Christopher Columbus in time for Columbus Day, the Pilgrims in time for Thanksgiving. Every year they say we’re going to get right up to the present, but we always get stuck in the Industrial Revolution. We got to World War 1 in seventh grade – who knew there had been a war with the whole world? We need more holidays to keep the social studies teachers on track.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

326. “Dr. Kerr rose off the bed. “Damned fool,” he growled. “Excuse me?” I said. “Rowley, the imposter. Autumnal fever indeed. Your mother has yellow fever. There’s no doubt at all.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

327. “An unseen hand turned off the radio as he crossed the threshold, and bags of potato chips vanished, leaving the faint scent of salt to mix with vermilion oil paint and wet clay.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

328. “She wants to hear all about our day, how long I’ve lived in town, and asks little sideways questions about my parents, so she can figure out if I’m the kind of friend she wants for her daughter. I don’t mind. I think it’s nice that she cares.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

329. “I want to kill him.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

330. “I get out of bed and take down the mirror. I put it in the back of my closet, facing the wall. OUR.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

331. “Some stand-up comic cracks, ‘No, Melinda no es linda.’ They call me Me-no-linda for the rest of the period. This is how terrorists get started, this harmless fun.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

332. “Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such Thing as Wisdom; and no such Thing as publick Liberty, without Freedom of Speech. – Benjamin Franklin, 1722.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

333. “Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of strange little girls screaming through their fingers. My patient sisters, always waiting for me. I scroll through our confessions and rants and prayers, desperation eating us one slow bloody bite at a time.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

334. “I’d love to stay and chat, but my feet won’t let me. I walk home instead of taking the bus. I unlock the front door and walk straight up to my room, across the rug, and into my closet without even taking off my backpack. When I close the closet door behind me, I bury my face into the clothes on the left side of the rack, clothes that haven’t fit for years. I stuff my mouth with old fabric and scream until there are no sounds left under my skin.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

335. “Then Ms. Conners blows her whistle to stop and explain the retarded scoring system in tennis where the numbers don’t make sense and love doesn’t count for anything.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

336. “When people don’t express themselves, they die one piece at a time. You’d be shocked at how many adults are really dead inside- walking through their days with no idea who they are, just waiting for a heart attack, or cancer, or a Mack truck to come along and finish the job.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

337. “Mr. Freeman says fear is a great place to begin art.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

338. “A member of the Archery Club tries to say that we are all foreigners and we should give the country back to the Native Americans, but she’s buried under disagreement.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

339. “Afraid that my head might burst through the roof, I head for the mall. I have ten bucks in my pocket – what to spend it on? French fries – ten bucks’ worth of french fries, ultimate fantasy.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

340. “Finally, our own Devils hulk into the gym. The same boys who got detention in elementary school for beating the crap out of people are now rewarded for it. They call it football.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

341. “Never underestimate dainty little ladies.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

342. “Nothing good ever happens at lunch. The cafeteria is a giant sound stage where they film daily segments of Teenage Humiliation Rituals. And it smells gross.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

343. “I sniff again and wipe my eyes on my arm. The bruises are vivid, but they will fade.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

344. “I think the Merryweather cheerleaders confuse me because I missed out on Sunday School. It has to be a miracle. There is no other explanation. How else could they sleep with the football team on Saturday night and be reincarnated as virginal goddesses on Monday?”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

345. “I need a lawyer. I showed up every day this semester, sat my butt in every class, did some homework, and didn’t cheat on tests. I still get slammed in MISS. There is no way they can punish me for not speaking. It isn’t fair. What do they know about me? What do they know about the inside of my head? Flashes of lightning, children crying. Caught in an avalanche, pinned by worry, squirming under the weight of doubt, guilt. Fear.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

346. “The playground was a war of girls versus boys and now I feel shame cuz some kids must have wanted to stand with the other team, and some must have wanted new teams entirely, but the world was drawn for us binary in clumsy chalk lines, and we’d try to do better when we were in charge.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

347. “David’s tape recorder is allowed in the class to document “potential future violations.” The secretary doesn’t sound too upset at the idea that Mr. Neck could get canned. I bet she knows him personally.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

348. “This is how terrorists get started, this kind of harmless fun.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

349. “I head for my closet after school. I want to take the poster of Maya Angelou home, and I’d like to keep some of my tree pictures and my turkey-bone sculpture. The rest of the stuff can stay, so long as it doesn’t have my name on it. Who knows, some other kids may need a safe place to run to next year.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

350. “I feel like any minute a guy in a lavender suit will burst into the room with a microphone and bellow, “Another alternate-reality moment brought to you by Adolescence!”

— Laurie Halse Anderson