- a short stay in hell, steven peck
- "did i know her only for so short a time? strange, how a moment of existence can cut so deeply into our being that while ages pass unnoticed, a brief love can structure and define the very topology of our consciousness ever after." (p. 6)
- "hell was a machine. except us. here, her hand in mine was the one reality that severed us from the cold click-clack of hell. i rubbed her hand and she sighed; wasn't that meaning? wasn't that something we could cling to?" (p. 57)
- "we were a team, rachel and i. oh, i miss her so much. i think our love could have lasted forever. i'm sure it would have." (p. 58)
- the way of kings, brandon sanderson
- "'i'd surrendered my plans, but you've returned them to me. i'll guard you with my life, kaladin. i swear it to you, by the blood of my fathers.'" (p. 979)
- song of susannah, stephen king
- "she had taken the ring off, kissed it, and then dropped it at the foot of the path, where eddie would surely see it. because he would follow her at least this far, she knew it." (p. 116)
- "he wanted his gunna, goddammit, and not just for the one clean pair of jeans and the two clean shirts. nor for extra ammo or the whittling knife, fine as it was. there had been a lock of susannah's hair in his leather swag-bag, and it had still carried a faint whiff of her smell. that was what he missed." (p. 264)
- "families were made in many ways. blood was only one of them." (p. 406)
- "just don't strike me dead, eddie thought, and turned west. i need to get back to my sweetheart, so please don't strike me dead, whoever or whatever you are." (p. 429)
- "she understands how being afraid all the time makes one's friends more precious; how it makes every bite of every meal sweet; how it stretches time until every day seems to last forever, leading on to velvet night." (p. 576)
- the dark tower, stephen king
- "sometimes he pretends his folks die in a plane crash and she somehow does become his mother and she calls him poor little lad and poor little lost tyke and then by virtue of some magical transformation she loves him instead of just taking care of him, loves him loves him loves him the way he loves her, she's his mother." (loc. 1,489)
- "he begins to scream, at night he can scream, and mrs. greta shaw comes into the room. she sits on the edge of his bed, her face ghostly with blue-gray beautymud, and she asks him what's wrong 'bama and he is actually able to tell her. he could never have told his father or mother, had one of them been there to begin with, which they of course aren't, but he can tell mrs. shaw because while she isn't a lot different from the other help – the au pairs babysitters child minders school-walkers – she is a little different, enough to put his drawings on the fridge with the little magnets, enough to make all the difference, to hold up the tower of a silly little boy's sanity, say hallelujah, say found not lost, say amen." (loc. 1,524)
- "do any of us, except in our dreams, truly expect to be reunited with our hearts' deepest loves, even when they leave us only for minutes, and on the most mundane of errands? no, not at all. each time they go from our sight we in our secret hearts count them as dead. having been given so much, we reason, how could we expect not to be brought low as lucifer for the staggering presumption of our love?" (loc. 2,139)
- "then, slowly – as one perform an action with which he's unfamiliar – he held out his arms. looking up at him solemnly, never taking his eyes from roland's face, the boy jake moved between those killer's hands and waited until they locked at his back. he had had dreams of this that he would never have dared to tell." (loc. 2,159)
- "jake, meanwhile, said nothing. he stood with his head turned so his cheek rested against roland's midsection. his eyes were closed. he could smell rain and dust and blood on the gunslinger's shirt. he thought of his parents, who were lost; his friend benny, who was dead; the pere, who had been overrun by all those from whom he had so long fled. the man he held had betrayed him once for the tower, had let him fall, and jake couldn't say the same might not happen again. certainly there were miles ahead, and they would be hard ones. still, for now, he was content. his mind was quiet and his sore-heart was at peace. it was enough to hold and be held. enough to stand here with his eyes shut and to think my father has come from me." (loc. 2,165-2,170)
- "eddie was sitting with his arm around her. since the four of them had gotten back together, he touched susannah at every opportunity, as if needing to confirm the fact that she was more than just wishful thinking." (loc. 2,420)
- "'i'd carry you to the end of the world,' eddie said sentimentally, and kissed the tip of her nose." (loc. 2,934)
- "what made him glad was to hear the boy's laughter. it was right that jake should cry for the pere, who had been his friend, but it was good that he could still laugh. very good, indeed." (loc. 3,008)
- "susanah looked at eddie with her eyebrows raised. eddie gave her a tell-you-later look in return. it was a simple and perfect bit of wordless communication, the sort people who love each other take for granted." (loc. 3,356)
- "sheemie put his arms around roland's neck and hugged him tight. roland smiled and stroked his curly hair with his disfigured right hand. a loud, honking sob escaped sheemie's throat. susannah could see the tears in the corners of the gunslinger's eyes." (loc. 3,427)
- "the gunslinger turned toward him. there was something about the boy's face that almost always softened roland's own. looking at jake did not make the gunslinger handsome, but seemed to give his features a quality they didn't ordinarily have. susannah thought it was the look of love. and, perhaps, some thin hope for the future." (loc. 3,877)
- "eddie didn't exactly like being called bondsman, but he drank his water. roland knelt before him and put a brief, dry kiss on eddie's lips. 'i love you, eddie,' he said, and outside in the ruin that was thunderclap, a desert wind arose, carrying gritty poisoned dust." (loc. 4,028)
- "'thee's a fine boy,' roland said. 'fine and good, aye.' and although the gunslinger spoke almost absently, jake could have died happily enough at that moment." (loc. 4,905)
- "besides, he thought, if i'm not among friends here, i never will be." (loc. 5,218)
- "for a moment she didn't think he understood the invitation, or was pretending not to understand. then he came, pausing to re-holster his gun and to pick up oy. he moved in between jake and eddie. oy jumped into susannah's lap as though it were the most natural thing in the world. then the gunslinger put one arm around eddie's waist and the other around jake's. susannah reached up (the bumbler scrabbling comically for purchase on her suddenly tilting lap), put her arms around roland's neck, and put a hearty smack on his sunburned forehead. jake and eddie laughed. roland joined them, smiliing as we do when we have been surprised by happiness." (loc. 6,049)
- "we go for her, roland had told jake. because later on she 'll remember who was there, and be grateful." (loc. 6,259)
- "while he had been talking to two men he didn't like, the boy whom he loved more than all others – more than he'd loved anyone ever in his life, even susan delgado – had passed beyond him for the second time." (loc. 6,301)
- "ake had saved him from death, which did not matter. ake had saved him from loneliness and shame after oy had been cast out by the tet of his kind, and that did." (loc. 8,341)
- "he drew her toward him and kissed her forehead with a tenderness that made her feel like crying." (loc, 9,358)
jan 1 2026 ∞
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