Here are the best phrases from Letters of love to the dead, a youth novel by Ava Dellaira published in 2014. It's about Laurel, a high school student who has just lost her sister May and recounts her life using a school assignment as a resource, in the one who must write letters to deceased persons.
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-We grow old, but my intention is that we never abandon our principles. May we never be old enough to remember who we are now, together. -Kristen.
-Being a rock star is the intersection between who you are and who you want to be. -Tristan.
-You can be noble, brave and beautiful and still find yourself falling. -Laurel.
-I feel like I'm drowning in my memories. Everything is too bright. -Laurel.
-After something really bad actually happens, the next worst thing is that people feel bad about it. It's like confirmation that something is terribly wrong. -Laurel.
-Perhaps what growing up really means is that you don't simply need to be a character who goes where the story tells him. It's knowing that you could actually be the author. -Laurel.
-It's sad when everyone knows who you are, but nobody knows you. -Laurel.
-I think that many people want to be someone, but we are scared to think that if we do not treat it, we will not be as good as everyone imagines we could be. -Laurel.
-Do you know that feeling, like when you think you know someone, more than anyone else in the world? You know you know them because you've seen them forever. Then you try to contact them and suddenly they are gone. You thought they belonged together (…). You want to protect them and you can't. -Laurel.
-But we are not transparent. If we want someone to know us, we have to tell them things. -Laurel.
-I still don't know how to make sense of this world. But maybe it's okay that it's bigger than what we can hold onto. -Laurel.
-I want people to know me, but if someone could see inside me, if someone saw that everything I feel is not what it is supposed to be, I don't know what I would do. -Laurel.
-I can't revive you. But I forgive myself. And I forgive you. May, I love you with all my being. For so long I always wanted to be like you. But I had to realize that I am someone too, and now I can bring you with me, your heart with mine, wherever it is. -Laurel.
-For a moment we forget everything that is difficult and we allow ourselves to feel what we wanted. -Laurel.
-Nirvana means freedom. Freedom from suffering. I guess some people say death is just that. So congratulations on your freedom I guess. The rest of us are still here, fighting all that has been broken in us. -Laurel.
-If the doors of perception were cleaned, everything would appear as it is, infinite. -Laurel quoting the poet Blake.
-He reminds me that air is not something that is just there. It is something that you breathe. -Laurel.
-So maybe, when we can say things, when we can write the words, when we can express how it feels, we are not so helpless. -Laurel.
-The river in the hall had turned into the loudest river I have ever heard. I thought maybe I could close my eyes and all those voices were going to take me away. -Laurel.
-When we can tell the stories, no matter how bad they are, we stop belonging to them. They turn from us. -Laurel.
-I don't think anyone has a perfect family to begin with. And that's why I think that's why we built our own. An average weirdo ball. This is how I feel with my friends. -Laurel.
-The truth is beautiful, no matter what it is. Even if it's creepy or bad. It is beauty for the simple fact of being true. And the truth is bright. The truth makes you more than yourself. -Laurel.
-People can leave, and then they can come back. It sounds simple, like an obvious thing. But I realized that the truth about it seemed important. -Laurel.
-The universe is bigger than anything that can fit in your mind. -May.
-When we say things, sometimes we hear silence, or echoes. (…) And that's really lonely. But that only happens when we weren't really listening. It means that we are not ready to listen yet. Because every time we speak there is a voice. It is the world answering. -Laurel.
-There are many human experiences that challenge the limits of our language. That is one of the reasons why we have poetry. -Mrs. Buster.
-I know I wrote letters to people who no longer have addresses in this world, I know they are dead. But I listen to them. I listen to all of you. We are here. Our lives matter. -Laurel.
-I wish you could tell me where you are now. I mean, I know you're dead, but there must be something in a human being that can't just disappear. -Laurel.
-I know it can be hard to believe that someone loves you if you are afraid of being yourself, or if you are not exactly sure who you are. It can be hard to believe that someone is not going to leave you. -Laurel.
-When you set an intention, you can create transformation. -Laurel quoting Kristen.
-I would have given him every part of me if he had wanted it that way. -Laurel.
-The thing about traditions is that they keep the shape of your memory. -Laurel.
-We kissed and I felt that if my shadow could stay inside his, then he could overshadow everything he didn't want to remember. -Laurel.
-No one can save you, not really. Not from yourself. -Tristan.
-I think that by beauty, one does not simply imply that it is beautiful. One implies that it is something that makes us human. -Laurel.
-Sometimes we want our bodies to do a better job than showing the things that hurt us, the stories that we keep hidden within us. -Laurel.
-Each of us are weird in different ways, but on the whole, that's actually normal. -Laurel.
-I mean, words may not be good for a wide variety of things. But you know, I guess we need to try. -Hannah.
-A friend is someone who gives you total freedom to be yourself, especially to feel or not to feel. Whatever it is you're feeling at any moment, it's fine with them. That's what true love boils down to, letting a person be who they really are. -Laurel quoting Jim Morrison.
-Once you fear something, many things can scare you. -Laurel.
-Sometimes, your music sounds like there is too much inside of you. Maybe you couldn't just let it all out. Maybe that's why you died. Like you exploded from the inside. -Laurel.
-When we are in love, we are both completely in danger and completely saved. -Tristan.
-Sometimes we do things because we feel a lot inside of us, and we do not realize how it affects someone else. -Laurel.
-Nothing is worse than when someone who is supposed to love you just leaves. -Laurel.
-It was a world full of feelings for which I still had no words. -Laurel.