Liane Quotes & Sayings

A third child would be like sliding down a snake in a game of Snakes and Ladders. — Liane Moriarty

As seductive as it might have been to erase the grief and pain of the last ten years, it was also a lie. Young Alice was a fool. A sweet, innocent fool. Young Alice hadn't experienced ten years of living. — Liane Moriarty

Pandora. Zeus sends her off to marry Epimetheus, a not especially bright man she's never even met, along with a mysterious covered jar. Nobody tells Pandora a word about the jar. Nobody tells her not to open the jar. Naturally, she opens the jar. — Liane Moriarty

Grace quite likes the fact that you can think something is one way all your life, and it turns out you're wrong, it can be something else entirely. It makes her feel free. Nothing is rigid. Things change. You can change your mind. You can change your thinking. Grace — Liane Moriarty

She didn't understand a damned thing about life except that it was arbitrary and cruel, and some people got away with murder while others made one tiny, careless mistake and paid a terrible price. — Liane Moriarty

It was unfortunate the way adults had to repress their true feelings. — Liane Moriarty

You don't look sweaty." "I showered," said Bonnie. "But my core body temperature is still quite high." "You'll catch a chill," said Madeline. "No I won't," said — Liane Moriarty

Their uptight concerns about what other people thought seemed like such a waste. Why had they been so careful and contained with their love? — Liane Moriarty

Actually, what she remembered most about that trip to Berlin was kissing a handsome, brown-haired German boy in a nightclub. He kept taking ice cubes from his drink and running them across her collarbone, which at the time had seemed incredibly sexy, but now seemed unhygienic and sticky. — Liane Moriarty

The problem is that Sophie would't want to date the sort of man who would want to date her. — Liane Moriarty

She has that euphoric feeling you get at the airport after you've checked in your luggage. Nothing can stop your journey. — Liane Moriarty

It's always the paragraphs I loved most, the ones I tenderly polished and re-read with pride, that my editor will suggest cutting. — Liane Moriarty

every relationship had its own "love account." Doing something kind for your partner was like a deposit. A negative comment was a withdrawal. The trick was to keep your account in credit. — Liane Moriarty

If he could just have one more chance, he'd act like the man he'd always believed himself to be. — Liane Moriarty

Cecelia turned her gaze away from the girls and looked at the shimmer blue of their kidney shaped swimming pool, with its powerful underwater light, the perfect symbol of suburban bliss, except for that strange intermit sound like a baby choking that was coming from the pool filter. — Liane Moriarty

You look well. Do you take some sort of secret supplement?" "Caffeine?" said Tiffany. — Liane Moriarty

This was how it could be done. This was how you lived with a terrible secret. You just did it. You pretended everything was fine. You ignored the deep, cramplike pain in your stomach. You somehow anesthetized yourself so that nothing felt that bad, but nothing felt that good either. — Liane Moriarty

I can only imagine how difficult it must be for someone facing racial or social prejudices to add autism to their list of struggles. It might be less stressful and at times, easier, to ignore the autism. — Liane Holliday Willey

Building your dream home is a fast-track to divorce, — Liane Moriarty

Helicopter parents. Before I started at Pirriwee Public, I thought it was an exaggeration, this thing about parents being overly involved with their kids. I mean, my mum and dad loved me, they were, like, interested in me when I was growing up in the nineties, but they weren't, like, obsessed with me. — Liane Moriarty

I haven't sought self-forgiveness because I feel I was preyed upon and not responsible for the many bad things that happened to me. — Liane Holliday Willey

Breathe in. She didn't give a fig what other people thought! Breathe out. Rubbish. She gave a whole fig tree. — Liane Moriarty

Do you have an opinion on anything?" "Not really." It was true, in a way. Opinions were for other people. It was fascinating how upset they got about them. — Liane Moriarty

Jewelry and clothes for Isabel and Polly. A piece of the Berlin Wall for Esther. — Liane Moriarty

She has become so irritatingly optimistic ever since she took up salsa dancing. — Liane Moriarty

There were worse things to be than sexist. For example, you could be the sort of person who pinched your fingers together while using the words teeny weeny. — Liane Moriarty

Third child in that suburban dream of his, now at the front — Liane Moriarty

The opening bars of a new band's song comes on the radio and Sophie quickly flicks up the volume. A good omen. She's been listening out for the song for ages. She's in the early stages of falling in love with it, where she knows the chorus but not the verses and she makes up pretend words so she doesn't have to stop singing. She sings lustily, enjoying how stupid she must look to other people, with her mouth opening and shutting and her face twisting in rock-star anguish. — Liane Moriarty

Today would be perfect in every way. The Facebook photos wouldn't lie. So much joy. Her life had so much so joy. That was an actual verifiable fact. — Liane Moriarty

He was all smug about how he'd negotiated flexible hours so he could continue being a hands-on dad, the dad his own father never got to be, and didn't he just lap up all the praise he got for being such an involved father, and laugh sympathetically, but enjoyably, over the fact that Clementine never got any praise for being an involved mother? — Liane Moriarty

How in the world had Bonnie managed to get Madeline's ex-husband out of bed at that time of morning to go to work in a homeless shelter? Nathan wouldn't get up before eight a.m. in the ten years they'd been together. Bonnie must give him organic blow jobs. "Abigail — Liane Moriarty

Ben told me that Tom had just spoken on the mobile to Alice and according to Tom she didn't say anything about falling over at the gym and she sounded "Just like Mum except maybe ten to fifteen percent grumpier than usual." I think he's learning percentages at school right now. — Liane Moriarty

Well, anyway, she certainly was not worried that John-Paul was having an affair. Definitely not. It wasn't a possibility. Not even a remote possibility. He wouldn't have time for an affair! When would he fit it in? He did travel a bit. He could fit in an affair then. — Liane Moriarty

Family life, even with just one little boy, had its own familiar rhythms, and it was perfectly possible to keep right on dancing like you always have, even when your mind is somewhere else. — Liane Moriarty

The information was like a secret weapon hidden in her pocket, which she held in the palm of her hand, caressing its contours, considering its power. — Liane Moriarty

Afterward, I felt it had been wrong not telling the family about the baby, because then I wanted them to know about the miscarriage, so that they knew the baby had existed. But when I told people, they seemed more interested in the fact that I'd kept the pregnancy a secret. They felt they'd been tricked. They said things like "Oh, I did wonder that day when you didn't drink at the Easter BBQ but you said you just didn't feel like drinking!" In other words, LIAR. — Liane Moriarty

We should Google it. Don't sneer at me. — Liane Moriarty

Now it seemed like she could twist the lens on her life and see it from two entirely different perspectives. The perspective of her younger self. Her younger, sillier, innocent self. And her older, wiser, more cynical and sensible self. — Liane Moriarty

Supposedly, the truth was always the best option. — Liane Moriarty

in times of crisis a person's face is somehow stripped back to something essential and universally human: all those labels like "beautiful," "sexy," "plain" became irrelevant. — Liane Moriarty

The other mothers, the teachers, the people. I didn't realize that having a child was so social. You're always talking to people. — Liane Moriarty

You get what you get and you don't get upset! screamed Fred. — Liane Moriarty

Shut up," said Madeline. "I thought we didn't say 'shut up' in our house." "Fuck off, then," said Madeline. — Liane Moriarty

Connie could make her feel slow and bovine; the way she'd suddenly snap her head around and bark a question that would leave Margie fumbling for an answer. — Liane Moriarty

This was not the career she'd dreamed of as an ambitious seventeen-year-old, but now it was hard to remember ever feeling innocent and audacious enough to dream of a certain type of life, as if you got to choose how things turned out. — Liane Moriarty

apart. It was why, if you valued your marriage, you kept a barricade around yourself and your feelings and your thoughts. You didn't let your eyes linger. You didn't stay for the second drink. You kept the flirting safe. You just didn't go there. At some point, Will made a choice to look at Felicity with the eyes of a single man. That was the moment he betrayed Tess. — Liane Moriarty

She had too much imagination. Too much empathy [ ... ] there was real pain in the world, right this very moment people were suffering unimaginable atrocities and you couldn't close your heart completely, but you couldn't leave it wide open either, because otherwise how could you possibly live your life, when through pure, random luck you got to live in paradise? — Liane Moriarty

I didn't properly appreciate one damned moment. — Liane Moriarty

Her mother could always charm her, even at the worst times. Just when Erika thought she was done, that was it, she could take no more, her mother charmed her back into loving her. Her — Liane Moriarty

Did prisons have air-conditioning? Was it just primary schools that missed out? — Liane Moriarty

Alice would give anything, anything at all, to be lying in bed with Nick, waiting for a cup of tea. Maybe he got sick of making her cups of tea? Was that it? Had she taken him for granted? Who did she think she was, some sort of princess, lying in bed waiting for cups of tea to be delivered. — Liane Moriarty

He was a selfish, pompous, egocentric, nasty man. She did not want to be married to him, but she did not want him to marry someone else. She did not want him, but she wanted him to want her. — Liane Moriarty

He owned an apricot polo shirt, and ironed it himself. Yes, he was probably gay. — Liane Moriarty

Every day I think, 'Gosh, you look a bit tired today,' and it's just recently occurred to me that it's not that I'm tired, it's that this is the way I look now. — Liane Moriarty

Of course, a minute was enough. Never take your eyes off them. Never look away. It happens so fast. It happens without a sound. All those stories in the news. All those parents. All those mistakes she'd read about. ... Children with stupid, foolish, neglectful parents. Children who died while surrounded by so-called responsible adults. And each time she would pretend to be non-judgmental, but really, deep down she was thinking: Not me. That could never really happen to me. — Liane Moriarty

Women are like the Olympic athletes of grudges. — Liane Moriarty

it," finished Susi. "It's almost worth it." Celeste met Susi's raccoon eyes. "Yes." The blandness of Susi's gaze said nothing at all except, Got it. She wasn't being kind and maternal, and she wasn't reveling in the delicious superiority — Liane Moriarty

bemused. "You wouldn't — Liane Moriarty

Good Lord. The first person she sees is Mick Drummond, with his ancient bobbing head. Would that man never die? Was he immortal? Was he real? — Liane Moriarty

Nathan kissed Madeline on the cheek and shook Ed's hand enthusiastically. He took an ostentatious relish in the civility of his dealings with his ex-wife and family. — Liane Moriarty

They had invited Dakota to Holly's birthday party! Hopefully they'd remember to feed their guests. He'd take some food along, just in case... She said only Dakota was invited to the birthday party, not them. She said it was probably a 'drop off party.' He didn't know what she was talking about. He would take meatballs, maybe. A case of champagne. — Liane Moriarty

Then he kissed her so deeply and so completely that she felt like she was falling, floating, spiraling down, down, down, like Alice in Wonderland. — Liane Moriarty

She was the missing ingredient they needed. The hint of nutmeg. Connie — Liane Moriarty

...the terrible though occurred to her that perhaps she'd always unconsciously believed that because Sam didn't cry, he therefore didn't feel, or he felt less, not as profoundly or deeply as she did. Her focus had always been on how his actions affected her feelings, as if his role was to do things for her, to her, and all that mattered was her emotional response to him, as if a "man" were a product or service, and she'd finally chosen the right brand to get the right response. Was it possible she'd never seen or truly loved him the way he deserved to be loved? As a person? An ordinary, flawed, feeling person? — Liane Moriarty

It won't happen again, I swear it!" Karic rasped.

"If we'd reached my lair in time it never would have happened at all!"

"But it did, it did and nothing will ever be the same! — Kathleen Morgan

Every marriage, every family, has its mysteries. — Liane Moriarty

Your child was a little stranger, constantly changing, disappearing and reintroducing himself to you. — Liane Moriarty

A red traffic light loomed, and Cecilia slammed her foot on the brake. The fact that Polly no longer wanted a pirate party was breathtakingly insignificant in comparison to that poor man (thirty!) crashing to the ground for the freedom that Cecilia took for granted, but right now, she couldn't pause to honor his memory, because a last-minute change of party theme was unacceptable. That's what happened when you had freedom. You lost your mind over a pirate party. — Liane Moriarty

However, at the end of the night I saw Nick stomping out to the car park, obviously in a terrible mood. They take their lives so seriously, these young people. "Just appreciate the fact that you can stomp so energetically," I wanted to say to him. I'd pay a million dollars to be Alice and Elisabeth's age again for just one day. I'd dance like Olivia's butterfly and bite into crisp green apples and run across hot sand into the surf, and I'd walk, as far as I wanted, wherever I wanted, in big loping, leaping strides, with my head held high and my lungs filling with air. — Liane Moriarty

It gave me a shock. A sudden shock of indescribable pain, like when you're a kid, and you're hit on the nose with a basketball on a cold morning, and you cannot believe how much it hurts, and your friends all laugh and you want your mother so bad. — Liane Moriarty

So now I just assume that it won't work, and that if it does work, I'll lose it anyway. This is meant to protect me, although it doesn't, because somehow the hope sneakily finds its way in. I'm never aware of the hope until it's gone, whooshed away like a rug pulled from under my feet, each time I hear another I'm sorry. — Liane Moriarty

Now her voice was loud and clear. This can happen to anyone. — Liane Moriarty

I want gunshots and canned laughter and dog food commercials. Nothing seems too tragic when the television is blaring. — Liane Moriarty

You mustn't take any notice of her,' says Enigma. 'I often sing a little song in my head until she's finished talking. — Liane Moriarty

I understand now that desperate, clumsy desire to make people feel better - even when you know perfectly well that nothing will. — Liane Moriarty

It was always like that. They never said sorry. They just threw down their still-loaded weapons, ready for next time. — Liane Moriarty

She reminds herself that everyone has thoughts they wouldn't care to share with the world. Many people have quite perverse thoughts about doing things with animals or fruit, or being spanked by nurses. The difference, of course, is that their thoughts are securely locked away behind bland faces, whereas Sophie's are always in danger of being revealed to all in a sudden flood of colour. — Liane Moriarty

The suffragettes didn't starve themselves for the vote, so that you girls could starve yourselves for a man. — Liane Moriarty

I seriously don't understand how men came to rule the world, she'd said to her sister, Bridget, this morning, after she'd told her about how John-Paul had lost his rental car keys in Chicago. It had driven Cecilia bananas seeing that text message from him. There was nothing she could do! This type of thing was always happening to John-Paul. Last time he went overseas he'd left his laptop in a cab. The man lost things constantly. Wallets, phones, keys, his wedding ring. His possessions just slid right off him. — Liane Moriarty

John-Paul did not have the requisite organizational abilities to handle bigamy. He would have slipped up long ago. Turned up at the wrong house. Called one of his wives by the wrong name. He'd be constantly leaving his possessions at the other place. — Liane Moriarty

An attractive, elegant, slim woman. The sort of woman she never thought it was possible for her to be. She had become one of those women, those other women, who had seemed too perfectly put together to be real. — Liane Moriarty

She'd never really existed to him. She was of no consequence in his life. He was married to a beautiful woman. Jane was pornography. Jane was the adult movie that didn't appear on his hotel bill. Jane was Internet porn, where every fetish can be fulfilled. You have a fetish for humiliating fat girls? Enter your credit card number and click right here. — Liane Moriarty

hear you're going to be on crutches for quite a while." "Yes, well - " "Abigail has already said she's moving back home to help you." "Oh," said Madeline. "Oh." She fingered the pink petals of the flowers. "Well, I'll talk to her about it. I'll be perfectly fine. She doesn't need to look after me." "No, but I think she wants to move back home," said Nathan. "She's looking for an excuse." Madeline and Ed looked at each other. Ed shrugged. "I always thought the novelty would wear off," said Nathan. "She missed her mum. We're not her real life." "Right." "So. I should get going," said Ed. "Could you stay for a moment, mate? — Liane Moriarty

there was the pure, primal pain of grief, and other times there was anger, the frantic desire to claw and hit and kill, and — Liane Moriarty

You're like a favorite pillow. I have to pack you wherever I go. — Liane Moriarty

Polly had arrived in the world outraged to discover that her sisters had gotten there before her. — Liane Moriarty

One of the jobs of advertising was to give the consumer rational reasons for their irrational purchases. — Liane Moriarty

When you didn't let a woman help, it was a way of keeping her at a distance, of letting her know that she wasn't family, of saying I don't like you enough to let you into my kitchen. — Liane Moriarty

Why hadn't that been part of his stupid lifelong redemption program: Do what my wife asks immediately so she doesn't feel like a nag. — Liane Moriarty

If only you were born a hundred years ago, when you could have gone through days of natural labour before bleeding naturally to death, — Liane Moriarty

I'm thinking my next book should be set on a tropical island, which will obviously require days, even weeks of meticulous research, but I'm prepared to make that sacrifice. That's just the sort of dedicated writer I am. — Liane Moriarty

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'Yes, OK, but so what if I was!' Interrupted Jane. 'What if I was! That's my point. What if I was a bit overweight and not especially pretty? Why is that so terrible? So disgusting? Why is that the end of the world?'
Madeline found herself without words. To be fat and ugly actually would be the end of the world for her.
'It's because A woman's entire self-worth rests on her looks,' said Jane. 'That's why. it's because we live in a beauty-obsessed society where the most important thing a women can do is make herself attractive to men.
. — Liane Moriarty

If an arm-less, leg-less woman on a skateboard could find a man, surely Sophie was doing something very, very wrong? How did this woman meet him? Pull on his trouser leg as she rolled by him in a nightclub?) Now — Liane Moriarty

She had forgotten this: the way your senses exploded and your pulse raced, as if you were properly awake after a long sleep. She had forgotten the thrill, the desire, the melting sensation. It just wasn't possible after ten years of marriage. Everyone knew that. It was part of the deal. She'd accepted the deal. It had never been a problem. She hadn't even known she'd missed it. If she ever thought about it, it felt childish, silly - "sparks flying" - whatever, who cares, she had a child to care for, a business to run. But, my God, she'd forgotten the power of it. How nothing else felt important. — Liane Moriarty

Death was the hot bath you promised yourself while you endured small talk and uncomfortable shoes. You could stop pretending to have a good time when you were dead. — Liane Moriarty

But women like Tess didn't seem to have that need to share the ordinary facts of their lives, and that made Cecilia desperate to know them. — Liane Moriarty

Or, just ignore it, one day you'll turn forty and you'll slowly realize you don't feel the eyes anymore, and the freedom is a relief, but you'll also sort of miss it, and when a truck driver whistles at you while you're crossing the road, you'll think, Really? For me? It had seemed like a really genuine, friendly whistle too. It was a little humiliating just how much time she'd devoted to analyzing that whistle. — Liane Moriarty

The middle-aged woman she would have become, so sure of herself and her place in the world, bossy and loving, condescending and impatient with her dear old mum, — Liane Moriarty

Oh, Pandora. Where's your willpower? You were told not to open that box, you snoopy girl, you typical woman with your insatiable curiosity; now look what you've gone and done. When for one thing it was a jar, not a box, and for another - how many times does she have to say it? - nobody said a word about not opening it! — Liane Moriarty

Go to sleep then, safe in the financial fortress you built on a transgression and yet still it stands. — Liane Moriarty