268 Quotes by Katherine Paterson

This story is about John, who was a private in the 2nd Georgia Battalion Infantry. I had always been told that John had taken part in Pickett’s Charge, the bloody assault on Cemetery Ridge on July 3, 1863. Actually he was mortally wounded very close to Cemetery Hill on July 2 the day before that tragic charge.

This is what art is all about. It is weaving fabric from the feathers you have plucked from your own breast. But no one must ever see the process – only the finished bolt of goods. They must never suspect that that crimson thread running through the pattern is blood.

Kids often ask me if characters are real or made up – and I always tell them, ‘I hope they’re real but I made them up.’

Don’t tell me no one ever gave you a chance. You don’t need anything given to you. You can make your own chances. But first you have to know what you’re after, my dear.

Boy, girl, you just better not try me.” He made her swear on the Bible never to tell and never to follow, but still he lay awake a long time. How could he trust everything that mattered to him to a sassy six-year-old? Sometimes it seemed to him that his life was delicate as a dandelion. One little puff from any direction, and it was blown to bits.

Then Jess gave himself over to the numbness that was buzzing to be let out from a corner of his brain.

Leslie was more than his friend. She was his other, more exciting self – his way to Terabithia and all the worlds beyond.

Listening to that woman was like licking melted ice cream off the carton.

Jess’s feelings about Leslie’s father poked up like a canker sore. You keep biting it, and it gets bigger and worse instead of better.