Welcome to my first ever Top 10 Tuesday, a popular weekly meme hosted by The Broke and The Bookish. The topic this week is:

April 14: Top Ten Inspiring Quotes from Books (anything that inspires you, challenges you, makes you think, encourages you, etc.)

Here are ten of my favorite quotes from books and/or authors.

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“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies, said Jojen. The man who never reads lives only one.

George R.R. Martin, A Dance With Dragons.

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“Nothing behind me, everything ahead of me, as is ever so on the road.”

Jack Kerouac, On the Road.

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“It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything.”

Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club.

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“I am a collection of oddities, a circus of neurons and electrons: my heart is the ringmaster, my soul is the trapeze artist, and the world is my audience. It sounds strange because it is, and it is, because I am strange.”

David Arnold, Mosquitoland.

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“It’s my experience that people are a lot more sympathetic if they can see you hurting, and for the millionth time in my life I wish for measles or smallpox or some other easily understood disease just to make it easier on me and also on them.”

Jennifer Niven, All The Bright Places.

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“How do you rid the Earth of humans? Rid the humans of their humanity.”

Rick Yancey, The 5th Wave.

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“I got to thinking that poems were like people. Some people you got right off the bat. Some people you just didn’t get–and never would get.”

Benjamin Alire Saenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe.

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“I know the trees here so well that I can close my eyes and see each one but I try not to close my eyes so much—-it’s easier to stay positive with your eyes open.”

Sally Green, Half Wild.

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“You do not write your life with words…you write it with actions. What you think is not important. It is only important what you do.”

Patrick Ness, A Monster Calls.

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“The truly frightening flaw in humanity is our capacity for cruelty – we all have it.”

Gillian Flynn, Dark Places. 

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These are some of the few quotes that have spoken to me. What are some of your favourite quotes and what do they mean to you?