Top 200 Shannon Hale Quotes (2024 Update)
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51. “She closed the book and put her cheek against it. There was still an odor of a library on it, of dust, leather, binding glue, and old paper, one book carrying the smell of hundreds.”

— Shannon Hale

52. “She wore white heirloom lace about her throat And in her hair a bright golden feather A pearl like a plum hung ripe from her neck But her smile fetched ten gold together.”

— Shannon Hale

53. “Everyone needs a smile and a friend, whether they know it or not.-Shannon Hale.”

— Shannon Hale

54. “I let my head fall back, and I gazed into the Eternal Blue Sky. It was morning. Some of the sky was yellow, some the softest blue. One small cloud scuttled along. Strange how everything below can be such death and chaos and pain while above the sky is peace, sweet blue gentleness. I heard a shaman say once, the Ancestors want our souls to be like the blue sky.”

— Shannon Hale

55. “Figure out what is real for you. No use leaning on someone else’s story all your life.”

— Shannon Hale

56. “Things are never lost to you; you are lost to them. If ever in need of a Thing that has lost you, simply stop hiding from it.”

— Shannon Hale

57. “Oh, but I like my geese. Like cats, they can’t be told what to do, and like dogs, they’re loyal, and like people, they talk every chance they get.”

— Shannon Hale

58. “Razo knew he was best at nothing, except maybe cramming two cherries into a single nostril.”

— Shannon Hale

59. “The three girls were sitting and lying beside her, holding one another, weeping, their arms and legs and hair tangled like the roots of close trees, sobs shaking them like leaves in a high wind.”

— Shannon Hale

60. “Sometimes my fancy gets to floating inside me, threatening to carry me away like a leaf on a wind. Better to be a stone.”

— Shannon Hale

61. “For one thing, everyone there is so clever. Do they think me dull? Perhaps I should assure them that our goats enjoyed listening to me for hours on end. I am certain their bleats meant “Do go on, Miri, darling. You are immensely entertaining.” Your immensely entertaining sister, Miri.”

— Shannon Hale

62. “Her eyes were distant, and she seemed to be listening to that voice that first told her the story, a mother, sister, or aunt. Then her voice, like her singing, cut through the crickets and crackling fire.”

— Shannon Hale

63. “Saying my story makes me want to change it, make it sound pretty the way I do with the stories I tell the workers. I’d like it to have a beginning as grand as a ball and an ending in a whisper, like a mother tucking in a child for sleep.”

— Shannon Hale

64. “Ah, now, don’t cry over lost years and forgetfulness. The tales tell what they can. The rest is for us to learn...”

— Shannon Hale

65. “Wait, I want more green. I hope I did not imply I only wanted your colors. We can’t turn a cold shoulder to green, and blue, and purple, for the sake of all ordered things, how can you dismiss purple? Celi, call Nom back and tell him of my need for purple!”

— Shannon Hale

66. “If you’re listening Big Brother, I refuse to be Fanny Price.”

— Shannon Hale

67. “Sometimes things aren’t impossible the first time I try, because I don’t know they’re impossible yet. I probably couldn’t do it again, though.”

— Shannon Hale

68. “We were quiet, two tiny specks glued down by gravity, peering at a universe that didn’t notice us back.”

— Shannon Hale

69. “In movies, we are accustomed to seeing handsome actors. It’s so commonplace on the screen, large or small, that we barely note it as extraordinary. But in life, rarely do we encounter an onslaught of beauty, entire a hive of handsomeness, find ourselves awash in an ocean of attractiveness, drowning in a miasma of hotness.”

— Shannon Hale

70. “Ani felt a stirring, a hope, a winged thing waking up in her chest and brushing her heart with it’s feathers.”

— Shannon Hale

71. “I feel like a tiny bug, and the world is a hungry bird looking down at me.”

— Shannon Hale

72. “Words can fall hard like a boulder loosed from a cliff. Words can drift unnoticed like a weed seed on a breeze. Words can sing.”

— Shannon Hale

73. “Listen to your second thought, or the third might be too late.”

— Shannon Hale

74. “For you when you’re feeling lonely and worried so you’ll remember that you’re not alone.”

— Shannon Hale

75. “The book smelled dusty and old but also carried a sweet tang, a hint of something inviting. She opened to the first page and started to read, pronouncing the words in a reverent whisper.”

— Shannon Hale

76. “I wonder if everyone who faces death hurts like this. It’s as though for the first time I realize how much just being alive makes my body ache. But I don’t want that ache to stop.”

— Shannon Hale

77. “Rock Canyon OB-GYN: We’re GYNO-MITE!”

— Shannon Hale

78. “She found half of a sea biscuit and offered it to Sus. The young girl held it between two fingers and licked a corner. “It tastes like dirt.” “And how would you know?” Felissa said, putting her fists on her hips. “You eat dirt often, do you? Snacking on mud pies when our backs are turned?” “It tastes how dirt smells,” Sus said.”

— Shannon Hale

79. “He had a dashing smile. It nearly dashed right off his face.”

— Shannon Hale

80. “Razo hopped back up and adopted a posture that said he was completely unruffled, never had been, and in fact was ready to do something manly like lift boulders or swallow live worms.”

— Shannon Hale

81. “Go on, son, you’re not doing me any good by bleeding.”

— Shannon Hale

82. “My ma says a rock lasts forever, but people don’t, and that’s what makes them more precious.”

— Shannon Hale

83. “Its important to know stories. I felt the earth shift to make a place for you when you were born, and I came to tell you stories while you are young. And like me, you were born with a word on your tongue.”

— Shannon Hale

84. “I keep thinking about a tale my nurse used to read to me about a bird whose wings are pinned to the ground. In the end, when he finally frees himself, he flies so high he becomes a star. My nurse said the story was about how we all have something that keeps us down.”

— Shannon Hale

85. “When the mountain quaked Like an elbow’s nudge Like a shout that something is wrong The people awoke and Knew, yes, knew, that bandits had come.”

— Shannon Hale

86. “No one had ever called her wild before. She wanted to be wild now, for him. Wild seemed more enticing then a bowl of berries.”

— Shannon Hale

87. “Charlotte couldn’t allow herself to dwell on how it felt to hold Eddie’s hand – as if all that mattered in the world were expressed in that touch; as if she would be safe and happy forever because this wonderful man wanted to be beside her; as if doves had come to nestle and coo beseechingly in her bosom. No, she really couldn’t allow herself to dwell on that, especially if doves were involved. Doves crossed the line. As they often do.”

— Shannon Hale

88. “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a thirty-something woman in possession of a satisfying career and fabulous hairdo must be in want of very little.”

— Shannon Hale

89. “I didn’t raise you I be good and weak. I raised you to be powerful and happy.”

— Shannon Hale

90. “Uge, save me from the sauce of their loveyness-raso Forest Born.”

— Shannon Hale

91. “Careful with the accusations of insanity, oh my lady whose home is a tower with windows of brick, all for the sake of some skinny-ankled, laugh-prone boy of a khan.”

— Shannon Hale

92. “Sometimes I think they’re all ridiculous. There I was, a sensible person with thoughts in my head, offering a solution. And they wouldn’t listen. What aggravation, to believe I can help and yet not be allowed. -Dashti.”

— Shannon Hale

93. “Courage is feeling justly afraid and yet still doing what is right.”

— Shannon Hale

94. “Felix can’t act his way out of a box.” “Boxes are tricky,” Felix said, frowning. “And sometimes they’re taped shut.”

— Shannon Hale

95. “I’m the sheen on water, Rin thought. I’m a looking glass. I’m not real.”

— Shannon Hale

96. “The snow was too light to stay, the ground too warm to keep it. And the strange spring snow fell only in that golden moment of dawn, the turning of the page between night and day.”

— Shannon Hale

97. “So I will just say it. I cannot love you as a man loves a woman. I am so sorry if I have presumed what is not true or have taken liberties with your sentiments. I hope you can forgive me.”

— Shannon Hale

98. “I couldn’t remember the last time I had stayed up into the squeaky hours of the night because I couldn’t put a book down, and that was a tragedy.”

— Shannon Hale

99. “The next afternoon break, Miri joined the others outside. The sun’s glare off the snow made her eyes water, but it seemed the most beautiful day Miri could remember. The sky was achingly blue. The snow that crunched under her boot spread over stone and hillock like spilled cream. The cold made the world feel clean and new, a day for beginnings.”

— Shannon Hale

100. “I do like the world quite a lot.”

— Shannon Hale