"Leaving us with Eric is like hiring a babysitter who spends his time sharpening knives."

"I don't understand', I say,'why they care what I think, as long as I'm acting how they want me to.''You're acting how they want you to now', he says,'but what happens when your Abnegation-wired brain tells you to do something else, something they don't want?"

"This is how we came by our factions: Candor, Erudite, Amity, Abnegation and Dauntless." Max smiles. "In them we find administrators and teachers and counselors and leaders and protectors. In them we find our sense of belonging, our sense of community, our very lives."

"We are not people who touch each other carelessly; every point of contact between us feels important, a rush of energy and relief."

"I could never hurt him enough to make his betrayal stop hurting. And it hurts, in every part of my body."

"She wanted us to have more than five choices. Now we have none."

"You don't believe things because they make your life better, you believe them because they're true."

"I hear something in her words that's right, but it's hard to believe her right now."

"It would be nice if life worked this way, stripping the dirt from our lives and sending us back out into the world clean. But some dirt is destined to lingered."

"I also remember that my father was one of the people who voted to get the Dauntless out of the factionless sector of the city. He said the poor didn't need policing; they needed help, and we could give it to them. But I would rather not mention that now, or here. It's one of the many things Erudite gives as evidence of Abnegation's incompetence."

"You don't have to tell me everything right away, but I have to tell you everything right away? Can't you see how stupid that is?"

"There is an art to Noavek bullshit," Cyra said as she muted the feed. "We're taught it from birth."

"I feel the monster of grief again, writhing in the empty space where my heart and stomach used to be. I gasp, pressing both palms to my chest. Now the monstrous thing has its claws around my throat, squeezing my airway. I twist and put my head between my knees, breathing until the strangled feeling leaves me."

"But a person can only keep reality - and anger - at bay for so long before the truth comes back again."

"I was angry with him before. I'm not really sure why. Maybe I was just angry that the world had become such a complicated place, that I have never known even a fraction of the truth about it. Or that I allowed myself to grieve for someone who was never really gone, the same way I grieved for my mother all the years I thought she was dead. Tricking someone into grief is one of the cruelest tricks a person can play, and it's been played on me twice."

"I feel something hot and violent writhing in my stomach. I want to hurt them. I stare at my eyes in the mirror. I want so, so I will."

"In my own relationships, I know that I should break up with someone who doesn't encourage me to be strong and make my own choices and do what's best in my life, so if you're dating someone who doesn't want you to be the best person you can be, you shouldn't be dating them."

"It's strange how a word, a phrase, a sentence, can feel like a blow to the head."

"I have something I need to tell you," he says. I run my fingers along the tendons in his hands and look back at him. "I might be in love with you." He smiles a little. "I'm waiting until I'm sure to tell you, though.""That's sensible of you," I say, smiling too. "We should find some paper so you can make a list or a chart or something."I feel his laughter against my side, his nose sliding along my jaw, his lips pressing my ear."Maybe I'm already sure," he says, "and I just don't want to frighten you."I laugh a little. "Then you should know better.""Fine," he says. "Then I love you."

"Moths," repeats Will. "You're afraid of moths?" "Not just a cloud of moths," she says, "like...a swarm of them. Everywhere. All those wings and legs and..." She shudders and shakes her head."Terrifying," Will says with mock seriousness. "That's my girl. Tough as cotton balls.""Oh, Shut up."

"I am afraid that if I start to sob, I will never stop until I shrivel up like a raisin."

"Sleep," he says. "I'll fight the bad dreams off if they come to get you.""With what?""My bar hands, obviously."In the moments before i drift off to sleep, i hear him whisper, "I love you, Tris."

"She taught me all about real sacrifice. That it should be done from love... That it should be done from necessity, not without exhausting all other options. That it should be done for people who need your strength because they don't have enough of their own."

"If we're afraid to be ourselves, then who are we? Where's there left to hide?But if we could concur that fear, we just might be strong, powerful. We just might be unstoppable."

"I just wanted to thank you' he says, his voice low.'A group of scientists told you that my genes were damaged, that there was something wrong with me - they showed you the test results that proved it. And even I started to believe it.' He touches my face, his thumb skimming my cheekbone, and his eyes are on mine, intense and insistent.'You never believed it,' he says 'Not for a second. You always insisted I was... I don't know, whole."

"When her body first hit the net, all I registered was a gray blur. I pulled her across it and her hand was small, but warm, and then she stood before me, short and thin and plain and in all ways unremarkable- except that she had jumped first. The stiff had jumped first.Even I didn't jump first.Her eyes were so stern, so insistent.Beautiful."

"If they told us what to believe, and we didn't come to it on our own, is it still true?"

"I realize that the decision might be simple. It will require a great act of selflessness to choose Abnegation, or a great act of courage to choose Dauntless, and maybe just choosing one over the other will prove that I belong."

"Okay. Then...I can talk. Ask me something.""Okay." He laughs shakily in my ear. "Why is your heart racing Tris?"I cringe and say, "Well, I...I barely know you. I barely know you and I'm crammed up against you in a box, Four, what do you think?"..."Maybe you were cut out for Candor," he says, "because you're a terrible liar."

"I suppose that now would be the time to ask for forgiveness for all the things I've done, but I'm sure my list would never be complete. I also don't believe that whatever comes after life depends on my correctly reciting a list of my transgressions...I don't believe that what comes after depends on anything I do at all."

"Looking away is submissive. Looking [..] in the eye is a challenge."

"What did you do, memorize a map of the city for fun? says Christina."Yes, says Will, looking puzzled. "Didn't you?"

"The tunnel is lit at long intervals, so in the dark space between each dim lamp, I fear that I am lost until a shoulder bumps mine. In the circles of light I am safe again."

"I think about pressing myself against him, but I can't, because all our secrets would keep a space between us."

"But you should know that about Dauntless- girl, guy, whatever, it doesn't matter here. What matters is what you've got in your gut."

"Want something else more than success. Success is a lovely thing, but your desire to say something, your worth, and your identity shouldn't rely on it, because it's not guaranteed and it's not permanent and it's not sufficient. So work hard, fall in love with the writing-the characters, the story, the words, the themes-and make sure that you are who you are regardless of your life circumstances. That way, when the good things come, they don't warp you, and when the bad things hit you, you don't fall apart."

"I can't imagine it's easy to like someone, hate them, and then lose them before any of those feelings are resolved."

"How strange that something so simple could have been instrumental in my decision to ruin one of my most relationships and friendships, and damage another."

"I close my eyes. I don't expect Four to reassure me, and he makes no effort to, but I feel better standing here than I did out there among the people who are my friends, my faction."

"Caleb told me that our mother said there was evil in everyone, and the first step to loving someone else is to recognize that evil in ourselves, so we can forgive them."

"Is it selfish for me to crave victory or is it brave?"

"Sometimes I forget that I can hurt you. That you are capable of being hurt."

"You're my daughter. I don't care about the factions."

"I have a scar-a faint gouge in my knee from when I fell down on the sidewalk as a child. It's always seemed stupid to me that none of the pain I've experienced has left a visible mark; sometimes, without a way to prove it to myself. I began to doubt that I had lied through it at all, with the memories becoming hazy over time. I want to have some kind of reminder that while wounds heal, they don't disappear forever- I carry them everywhere, always, and that is the way of things, the way of scars.That is what this tattoo will be, for me: a scar. And it seems fitting that it should document the worst memory of pain I have."

"I laugh, and it's laughter, not light, that casts out the darkness building within me, that reminds me I am still alive, even in this strange place where everything I've ever known is coming apart."

"I understand why she did all those things, but that doesn't mean we aren't still broken."

"Il dolore aveva un suo modo di scomporre il tempo. Pensavo al minuto successivo, all'ora successiva. Non c'era abbastanza spazio nella mia mente per mettere insieme tutti quei pezzi, per trovare le parole per riassumerla nella sua interezza.Ma la parte dell'"andare avanti", per quella le parole le avevo.'Trova un modo per andare avanti' dissi. 'Non deve necessariamente essere buono, o nobile. Basta che sia un motivo.'Conoscevo il mio: c'era una fame dentro di me e c'era sempre stata. Una fame piA1 forte del dolore, piA1 forte dell'orrore. Continuava a mordere anche dopo che ogni altra cosa dentro di me si era arresa. E quando finalmente le diedi un nome, scoprii che era qualcosa di molto semplice: desiderio di vivere."

"I breathe in. The water will wash my wounds clean. I breathe out. My mother submerged me in water when I was a baby, to give me to God. It has been a long time since I thought about God, but I think about him now. It is only natural. I am glad, suddenly, that I shot Eric in the foot instead of the head."

"I wonder if fears ever really go away, or if they just lose their power over us."

"The knife will only hurt for a moment. Then your choice will be made, and it will all be over."