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The Starless Sea QUOTES

The Starless Sea QUOTES

1 " It's never too late to change what you are, it took me a long time to figure that out. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

2 " For every tale carved in rock there are more inscribed on autumn leaves or woven into spiderwebs. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

3 " She gives him a hint of a bow as she returns to her feet, a gentle nod of her head, a movement that reminds him of the beginning of the dance. (Even a pirate can recognize the beginning of a dance.)

The next night the pirate stays back from the bars, a polite distance that could be closed in a single step, and the girl comes a breath closer. Another night and the dance continues. A step closer. A step back. A movement to the side. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

4 " She sat next to me and told me that we were the people that the narrative would have followed out from the party if we were in a movie or a novel or something. We were where the story was, the story you could follow like a string, not all the overlapping party stories in the house, tangled up with too many dramas soaked in cheap alcohol and stuffed into not enough rooms. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

5 " There is nothing now save for this room and this woman and this story. He can feel the way the story spreads out from this point, through space and through time and so much further than he ever imagined but this is the beating, buzzing heart of it. Right here and right now.

He's calm again. Relieved to have his Max back and even though he knows they both have other people they belong with there is still this room and this dance and this moment and it matters, maybe more than any of the others. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

6 " Where I am from they tell a story about it,’ the woman said, her attention on the work in front of her, the steady movement of her hands through the flour. ‘They say that every hundred years – some versions say every five hundred, or every thousand – the sun disappears from the daytime sky at the same time the moon vanishes from the night. They say their absence is coordinated so that they may meet in a secret location, unseen by the stars, to discuss the state of the world and compare what each has seen over the past hundred or five hundred or thousand years. They meet and talk and part again, returning to their respective places in the sky until their next meeting. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

7 " And there are always those who would watch Alexandria burn.
There always have been. There always will be. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

8 " Whatever happens will happen whether I worry about it or not. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

9 " Dorian runs a hand through his still sticky graying hair, feeling too old for all of these marvels; and wondering when he went from young and faithful and obedient to confused and adrift and middle aged. But he knows exactly when it was because that moment haunts him still. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

10 " She reaches her hand up toward the stars. Resting on her palm is a single card. She holds it out at the night sky, displaying it to the moon and the stars with a considerable amount of showmanship. Upon the card there is an empty void. The Ending. She flips the card over. A bright expanse. The Beginning. She flips it again and it turns to golden dust in her fingers. She takes a bow. The crown does not fall from her head but it slips and she straightens it and turns her attention back to the ground, back to her own story "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

11 " He has been reading (or rereading) a great many children's books as well, because the stories seem more story-like, though he is midly concerned this might be a symptom of an impending quarter-life crisis. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

12 " Even tiny empires fall. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

13 " Everyone is a part of a story, what they want is to be part of something worth recording "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

14 " Do you ever think about how many stories are out there?' she asks, placing a finger on the glass. 'How many dramas are unfolding around us right at this very moment? I wonder how long a book you would need to record them. You'd probably need an entire library to hold a single evening in Manhattan. An hour. A minute. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

15 " Hey," Zachary says and she looks up from her book with a dazed expression he's used to wearing himself, the disorientation of being pulled out of one world and back into another.
"Hi," Elena says, coming out of the fiction fog and tucking the Chandler in her bag. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

16 " Isn't that what anyone wants, though?" the girl with the cat-eye glasses asks in response. "To be able to make your own choices and decisions but to have it be part of a story?" You want that narrative there to trust in, even if you want to maintain your own free will."

"You want to decide where to go and what to do and which door to open but you still want to win the game... "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

17 " You wish to sail the Starless Sea and breathe the haunted air "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

18 " Can't make an egg without breaking a few metaphors. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

19 " Far beneath the surface of the earth, hidden from the sun and the moon, upon the shores of the Starless Sea, there is a labyrinthine collection of tunnels and rooms filled with stories. Stories written in books and sealed in jars and painted on walls. Odes inscribed onto skin and pressed into rose petals. Tales laid in tiles upon the floors, bits of plot worn away by passing feet. Legends carved in crystal and hung from chandeliers. Stories catalogued and cared for and revered. Old stories preserved while new stories spring up around them. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea

20 " The place is sprawling yet intimate. It is difficult to measure its breadth. Halls fold into rooms or galleries and stairs twist downward or upward to alcoves or arcades. Everywhere there are doors leading to new spaces and new stories and new secrets to be discovered and everywhere there are books. "

― Erin Morgenstern , The Starless Sea