Neal Shusterman

Lethargy. It's a word I know, because it's in one of my father's favorite expressions. Lethargy breeds lethargy. It means the more you lie around doing nothing, the more you want to lie around doing nothing. Your limbs and your mind feel so heavy that it becomes a major effort just to lift your arm to channel surf.

Mary believes she was put on earth to bring an end to the living world.__oth Nick and Mikey just stared at her.__hat do you mean _ end?_ asked Mikey.__nd means end. Complete and total destruction. She wants to kill everyone and everything. She wants to bring down every building, burn every forest, empty every ocean of life. She wants to turn the earth into a dead planet _

Walls don't fall without effort.

Hayden shouts, "To the new Teen Uprising!

It was easier to deal with Tennyson when he was fighting me; but having him on my side was frightening, because now I didn't know who the enemy was.

The thing was, if I had found a way to escape- even for just a little while- I knew the pain would be there waiting for me when I got back.

We'll never be ready. So I guess that means we're as ready as we'll ever be.

On a hairpin turn, above the dead forest, on no day in particular, a white Toyota crashed into a black Mercedes, for a moment blending into a blur of gray.

Man, Grandma, what big hair you have.""The better to style with, my dear.

One thing yo learn when you've lived as long as I have-people aren't all good, and people aren't all bad. We move in and out of darkness and light all of our lives. Right now, I'm pleased to be in the light.

Outside the rain finally began to fall, surging in fits and starts. __ love the way it rains here,_ he told her. __t reminds me that some forces of nature can never be entirely subdued. They are eternal, which is a far better thing to be than immortal.

If you__e ever studied mortal age cartoons, you__l remember this one. A coyote was always plotting the demise of a smirking long-necked bird. The coyote never succeeded; instead, his plans always backfired. He would blow up, or get shot, or splat from a ridiculous height.And it was funny.Because no matter how deadly his failure, he was always back in the next scene, as if there were a revival center just beyond the edge of the animation cell.I__e seen human foibles that have resulted in temporary maiming or momentary loss of life. People stumble into manholes, are hit by falling objects, trip into the paths of speeding vehicles.And when it happens, people laugh, because no matter how gruesome the event, that person, just like the coyote, will be back in a day or two, as good as new, and no worse__r wiser__or the wear.Immortality has turned us all into cartoons.

How do you judge the brightness of a light when you__e the source? A spotlight can never see the shadows it casts.

The question wasn't whether or not I cared about him; the question was, how much? I'm glad Tennyson didn't ask that, because then I'd have to ask myself; and I already knew the answer. I cared far more than was safe.

Did you ever get the feeling that everything was too perfect? Like the moment was so good that something had to be wrong? Kind of like the way a fish sees that bright, shiny lure just before it chomps down and gets hauled out of water to become someone's lunch.

Maybe we're standing like coins on the edge?"Allie considered this. "Meaning?""Meaning, we might be able to shake things up a little, and find a way to come up heads.""Or tails," suggested

Roland glares at Connor and Connor glares back. Then he says what he always says at moments like this."Nice socks."Although Roland doesn't look down right away, it derails him just enough for him to back off. He doesn't check to see if his socks match until he thinks Connor isn't looking. And the moment he does, Connor snickers. Small victories are bet­ter than none.

He's a conundrum- and there's still a piece missing from the puzzle." Whatever that piece was, there was a part of me telling me not to get involved- that it was too much to handle. That you shouldn't go out on a limb unless you're absolutely sure the limb can support your weight.