Book Republic

"Don’t ever apologize to an author for buying something in paperback, or taking it out from a library (that’s what they’re there for. Use your library). Don’t apologize to this author for buying books second hand, or getting them from bookcrossing or borrowing a friend’s copy. What’s important to me is that people read the books and enjoy them, and that, at some point in there, the book was bought by someone. And that people who like things, tell other people. The most important thing is that people read… "

"I needed to use the disabled toilet, so I went but discovered the door locked. I knew there were no other wheelchair users apart from my husband and I at the hotel, so I knocked on the door and asked them to hurry up. Three blonde, non-disabled girls in their twenties came out.
‘Why can’t you use the regular bathroom?’ I asked. One of the girls looked at me and said quite seriously, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t think people like you were out so late.’ I was shocked that people in this day and age would still think like that, so I replied, ‘It’s Christmas, they let us out later.’ She smiled and said, ‘Oh that’s nice.’"

"Shortly after I became a citizen I brought Karl to San Antonio in Texas so that he could sign the certificate that would mean that he also had citizenship. However, when he arrived back at school he had been marked absent, even though I had a letter from Homeland Security saying where he had been. It turned out the law in Texas didn’t allow absences from school to become a citizen. We went to our local Representative and a bill was drafted known as ‘Karl’s Bill’ that would amend current practices to allow for children to be absent if they needed to be in court, or with the Federal Government, so long as they were back in school before the end of the school day.
The bill was passed into law."

"A well-composed book is a magic carpet on which we are wafted to a world that we cannot enter in any other way."

"Anyone who says they have only one life to live must not know how to read a book."

"It’s up to you how you waste your time and money. I’m staying here to read: life’s too short."

"A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies,” said Jojen. “The man who never reads lives only one."

"Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia."

"Overnight the sky fell down. From the US and across the Atlantic the shockwaves travelled to the tiny island that for so many years had been letting the good times roll without ever wondering when the wheels would come off and burn."