Patricia Reilly Giff Quotes

She gives him candy. They're probably going to get married.

The girl's mouth was chapped, tight and pinched, her skin dry. Mama would say she looked woebegone, but as Bird looked at her eyes, the word she thought of was desperate.

He wrote stories about everything he saw, and he saw a lot. He walked through the streets of Brooklyn along the water, or leaned against the store windows on Livingston Street watching people hurrying along, making up stories about this one or that one.

How quiet everything was this Sunday afternoon, how still. No horse and wagon clopped down the street, no cart; no one stood on the corner talking. It was as if they were the only ones in the world.

She didn't want to touch the baby. Didn't want to know if she was dead. But still she reached down, her arms underneath that small body, and pulled it up against her. The body was burning with fever. But alive. Alive!

With just the sweep of a pen, Thomas, you can change the world, all of it.

I don't think he's touched a washcloth to his face since the day he was born.

Everything stopped: forks half raised, a bowl being passed. It seemed that the man was bathed in red, great swaths of it across his shirt and hands. And then Thomas realized: he was covered in blood.

Is there anyone noisier in the world than Bird Mallon?

And the boy was right in back of her, his neck thin as a pencil. "My name is Thomas," he said. "Thomas Neary." She didn't answer. "The horse's name is Alfred, in case you want to know." He screwed up his face. "Or maybe Fernando."

What was the use of writing if someone didn't read what you have to say?

Bird. A good name for her. She wasn't a sparrow or a songbird, though. She stood so straight, and her face was strong.

Outside it had begun to rain, a fine mist of a rain: fall leaves were plastered to the walkway, and puddles filled with bits of hay and coal lay in the street. A nice bit to remember for the writing. Water Street! He loved to look at it.

How could she know what she wanted to do with her life? All these years she thought she'd be a healer like Mama, and now she knew it was never going to happen.

Thomas watched him for a few minutes. Pop was good-looking, muscular, and his hair was almost gold even though it was getting a little thin on top. Thomas must have taken after his mother, whoever she was.