TOP TEN TUESDAY: 4TH MARCH 2025

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

^{Today’s prompt is: Things Characters Have Said (Maybe a character said something really profound or romantic or hilarious or heartbreaking. You could share witty one-liners, mic-drop moments, snippets of funny dialogue between multiple characters, catchphrases, quotes that have become a part of pop culture–like “May the odds be ever in your favour.”, etc.)}

This is quite an interesting prompt, and I am excited to share some of my favourite quotes from my favourite books. However, I think it will be hard to keep them to 10!

A Man Called Ove by Fredrick Backman: This book is simply exquisite, I have highlighted so many passages that I could fill the prompt using just this book… Anyway here is one quote I chose to share with you.

“And then she left him alone in a world where he no longer understood the language.“

Even though this quote is short, in my opinion speaks volumes and it definitely resonates with me.

2. The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune: This is my comfort book to go to book when I have a reading slump or when I just need to feel all warm and fuzzy inside. I have grown to love each one of the characters, and I reread it at least once a year. This book will always be one of my topmost recommended!

“Don’t you wish you were here?”

3. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: A beloved classic of mine and many others. The author was very progressive for his time, and this book shows it. No matter how many times I read it, I always discover something new and find a new meaning. Again, there are so many quotes I would love to use from this one…

“It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.”

4. Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor: This must be one of the most beautifully written books I have read to date. Absolutely stunning, it is magic.

“It was cruel. Like opening a birdcage to let the bird fly out, whilst all the while it’s tethered by the leg, and freedom is only an illusion.”

5. Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi: Picking up this book, I knew nothing about it, so I didn’t know what to expect. I only saw there were mixed reviews, and you either love it or hate it. I am beyond happy that I ended up loving every single line of it!

“It takes courage to say what has to be said.”

6. Foster by Claire Keegan: Don’t let its 89 pages fool you. Every page will touch your heart and pull at those heartstrings…

“God help you child. If you were mine, I’d never leave you in a house with strangers.”

7. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green: Let me say that this book broke me, and I don’t find any other book as sad as this one. This is probably the only book that made me sob whilst reading it, and I mean constant sobbing.

“You gave me a forever within the numbered days, and I’m grateful.”

8. The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks: When I was in high school, there was a writing competition that my Italian teacher signed me up for. At the time, I read this book and decided to use it as a reference for my short story. I did win a place, and they ended up publishing the book of all the 30 short stories from schools across Italy. I still can’t believe this happened to me, I was 17.

“The scariest thing about distance is that you don’t know whether they’ll miss you or forget you.”

9. The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman: I simply love this book, and Nobody and the other characters are in my heart.

“Name the different kinds of people,’ said Miss Lupescu. ‘Now.’

Bod thought for a moment. ‘The living,’ he said. ‘Er. The dead.’ He stopped. Then, ‘… Cats?’ he offered, uncertainly.”

10. Pax by Sarah Pennypacker: Another touching middle-grade book that I had to include.

“The plain truth can be the hardest thing to see when it’s about yourself. If you don’t want to know the truth, you’ll do anything to disguise it.”

And because I can’t just stop at 10, I had to add another one to this list by another auto-buy author for me Celeste Ng.

“It terrifies you. That you missed out on something. That you gave up something you didn’t know you wanted.” A sharp, pitying smile pinched the corners of her lips. “What was it? Was it a boy? Was it a vocation? Or was it a whole life?”
― Celeste Ng, Little Fires Everywhere

“It came, over and over, down to this: What made someone a mother? Was it biology alone, or was it love?”
― Celeste Ng, Little Fires Everywhere