My New Year's resolution for 2016 was to write down quotes I loved from books I read. I duly bought myself a notebook in which to do so, and I've already filled up the first two pages with quotes! All of the quotes I've written down so far are from All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. That book was full of shiver language (defined by me as writing that sends a shiver down your spine). Since I have this record of this beautiful writing, I wanted to share some of my favorite quotes from this book with you.
"Feeling as though some cupboard in the sky has just opened."
"Werner's heart pauses; the voice seems to echo in the architecture of his head."
"Her fingers walk the tightropes of sentences."
"Connecting his fingers to the engine of his mind."
"Lets his fingers trace the journeys of electrons."
"Wedges of wet sunlight" (a description of canned peaches)
"The weather in this place: you can feel it between your fingers."
"To feel the sentences hoist her up and carry her somewhere else."
"Both ride spirals of memory."
"Watching shadows disentangle themselves from night."
"A voice on the radio offering a loom on which to spin his dreams."
"Patches of sunlight are touching down everywhere."
"The harmonies like steadily thickening pearls on a strand."
"The evening air is a benediction."
"What mazes there are in this world. The branches of trees, the filigree of roots, the matrix of crystals, the streets her father re-created in his models. Mazes in the nodules on murex shells and in the textures of sycamore bark and inside the hollow bones of eagles. None more complicated than the human brain, Etienne would say, what may be the most complex object in existence; one wet kilogram within which spin universes."
"He listens to the notes and the silences between them."
"Chords float past in transparent riffles."
"Dreams of light thickening and settling across a field like snow."
"Memories cartwheel out of her head and tumble across the floor."
"To find the snails crawling along the rocks, these tiny wet beings straining calcium from the water and spinning it into polished dreams on their backs."
"It feels as if this woman has dropped a molten kernel of memory into her hands."
"Werner's heart pauses; the voice seems to echo in the architecture of his head."
"Her fingers walk the tightropes of sentences."
"Connecting his fingers to the engine of his mind."
"Lets his fingers trace the journeys of electrons."
"Wedges of wet sunlight" (a description of canned peaches)
"The weather in this place: you can feel it between your fingers."
"To feel the sentences hoist her up and carry her somewhere else."
"Both ride spirals of memory."
"Watching shadows disentangle themselves from night."
"A voice on the radio offering a loom on which to spin his dreams."
"Patches of sunlight are touching down everywhere."
"The harmonies like steadily thickening pearls on a strand."
"The evening air is a benediction."
"What mazes there are in this world. The branches of trees, the filigree of roots, the matrix of crystals, the streets her father re-created in his models. Mazes in the nodules on murex shells and in the textures of sycamore bark and inside the hollow bones of eagles. None more complicated than the human brain, Etienne would say, what may be the most complex object in existence; one wet kilogram within which spin universes."
"He listens to the notes and the silences between them."
"Chords float past in transparent riffles."
"Dreams of light thickening and settling across a field like snow."
"Memories cartwheel out of her head and tumble across the floor."
"To find the snails crawling along the rocks, these tiny wet beings straining calcium from the water and spinning it into polished dreams on their backs."
"It feels as if this woman has dropped a molten kernel of memory into her hands."
If you haven't yet read All the Light We Cannot See, I highly recommend it. The plot and characters are both memorable, but what really stood out to me was the atmosphere created by beautiful shiver language such as this!
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