Markus Zusak

“I like to work in the morning, usually from 7-12, and still always hope to do more later. At the end of a book, I just work most of the time, but in general, I like to be working nice and early.”

“She took a step and didn't want to take any more, but she did.”

“The bombs were coming-and so was I.”

“I looked at myself in that window, oblivious to all the people around me and I stared and smiled that particular smile. You know that smile that seems to knock you and tell you how pathetic you are? That's the smile I was smiling.”

“If I ever leave this place-I'll make sure I'm better HERE first.”

“...to swear with a ferocity that can only be described as a talent.”

“When I was growing up, I wanted to be a house painter like my father, but I was always screwing up when I went to work with him. I had a talent for knocking over paint and painting myself into corners. I also realized fairly quickly that painting bored me.”

“At first, all is black and white.Black on white.That's where I'm walking, through pages.These pages.Sometimes it gets so that I have one foot in the pages and the words, and the other in what they speak of.”

“Steadily, the room shrank, till the book thief could touch the shelves within a few small steps. She ran the back of her hand along the first shelf, listening to the shuffle of her fingernails gliding across the spinal cord of each book. It sounded like an instrument, or the notes of running feet. She used both hands. She raced them. One shelf against the other. And she laughed. Her voice was sprawled out, high in her throat, and when she eventually stopped and stood in the middle of the room, she spent many minutes looking from the shelves to her fingers and back again. How many books had she touched? How many had she felt? She walked over and did it again, this time much slower, with her hand facing forward, allowing the dough of her palm to feel the small hurdle of each book. It felt like magic, like beauty, as bright lines of light shone down from a chandelier. Several times, she almost pulled a title from its place but didn't dare disturb them. They were too perfect.”

“She leaned down and looked at his lifeless face and Leisel kissed her best friend, Rudy Steiner, soft and true on his lips. He tasted dusty and sweet. He tasted like regret in the shadows of trees and in the glow of the anarchist's suit collection. She kissed him long and soft, and when she pulled herself away, she touched his mouth with her fingers...She did not say goodbye. She was incapable, and after a few more minutes at his side, she was able to tear herself from the ground. It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on...”

“You're a dead man". I hear his voice again, and I see the words on my face when I get back in the cab and look in the rearview mirror.It makes me think of my life, my nonexistent accomplishments and my overall abilities in incompetence."A dead man", I think. He's not far wrong.”

“He switched off the light, came back and sat in the chair. In the darkness, Liesel kept her eyes open. She was watching the words.”

“Personally, I think sex should be like math.At school.No one really cares if they're crap at math. They even proclaim it. They'll say to anyone, "Yeah, I don't mind science and English, but I'm absolutely shithouse at math." And other people will laugh and say,"Yeah, me too. I would have a clue about all that logarithm shit. You should be able to say that about sex too. You should be proudly able to say, "Yeah I wouldn't have a clue about all that orgasm shit, ay. I'm okay at everything else but when it comes to that part I wouldn't have a clue.”

“There was an itchy lung for a last cigarette and an immense, magnetic pull toward the basement, for the girl who was his daughter and was writing a book down there he hoped to read one day. Liesel. His soul whispered it as I carried him. But there was no Liesel in that house. Not for me, anyway.”

“a young man was hung by a rope made of Stalingrad snow”

“The paper landed on the table, but the news was stapled to his chest. A tattoo.”

“Maybe everyone can live beyond what they're capable of.”

“I told her I loved the howling sound of her harmonica. That seemed to be the limit of my courage that night, and even those spoken words had to struggle their way out of my mouth. It's all very well for words to build bridges, but sometimes I think it's a matter of knowing when to do it. Knowing when the time's right.”

“Imagine smiling after a slap in the face. Then think of doing it twenty-four hours a day.”

“On the ration cards of Nazi Germany, there was no listing for punishment, but everyone had to take their turn. For some it was death in a foreign country during the war. For others it was poverty and guilt when the war was over, when six million discoveries were made throughout Europe.”