Jodi Picoult

After all, how many of us had tried to forget something traumatic...only to find it printed on the back of our eyelids, tattooed on our tongues?

You make yourself strong because it's expected of you. You become confident because someone beside you is unsure. You turn into the person others need you to be.

If you have a sister and she dies, do you stop saying you have one? Or are you always a sister, even when the other half of the equation is gone?

You know, the mind is a remarkable thing. Just because you can't see the wound doesn't mean it isn't hurting. It scars all the time, but it heals.

A real friend isn't capable of feeling sorry for you.

That's what happens to dreams, life gets in the way.

words are like nets - we hope they'll cover what we mean, but we know they can't possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder.

People ask all the time how I'm doing, but the truth is, they don't really want to know.

Envy, after all, comes from wanting something that isn't yours. But grief comes from losing something you've already had.

When you love someone, you say their name different. Like it's safe inside your mouth.

Once you had put the pieces back together, even though you may look intact, you were never quite the same as you'd been before the fall.

I wondered what happened when you offered yourself to someone, and they opened you, only to discover you were not the gift they expected and they had to smile and nod and say thank you all the same.

Just because you keep something a secret doesn't mean it never happened, no matter how much you want that to be true.

It's disappointing to know that someone can see right through you.

You know someone's right for you when the things they don't <i>have</i> to say are even more important than the things they do.