Middle Grade Voice Quotes

Lucas crept around the building to the back parking lot. And there it was, just like he had seen from the roof - a baby lying in a shopping cart. Lucas's mind went negative. What if the kid was dead? He tried to think if he had ever seen a dead person before. He'd never been to a funeral, and he knew he had never seen a dead baby. And he definitely didn't want to.
His heart pounded in his chest.
Lucas walked, almost tiptoed, toward the shopping cart. The last of the parking lot lights flickered out, leav-ing only the early morning sun. He moved across the blacktop, making sure not to step on a white line. At this moment he needed all the luck he could muster. As he got closer to the cart, he held his breath and swallowed. Then he grabbed the shopping cart handle and looked over into the basket.
He gasped. ~ Paul Aertker

...but freedom is scary. ~ Renata Suerth

Trust me, there are things in this mountain that will make your jaw bounce off the floor. ~ Jaleigh Johnson

Are you suggesting we eat cursed fruit? Vicious fruit? Attacking fruit? ~ Merrie Haskell

My perfectly measured ingredients should have mixed and turned into an epic lava. Instead it looks like an outtake from an old sci-fi movie. Green goo has killed my volcano. My chance to win the science fair at Sendak has been slimed! ~ Angela Cervantes

Grandpa stopped speaking the day he killed my brother, John. ~ Crystal Chan

Wait. Is a real, live adult person actually asking me details about the games I play? This is unheard of. ~ Denis Markell

I do believe losing your head has made you more intelligent. ~ Vivian French

Max, you cannot stay in the background forever. It is time to stand out in front. You have all that you need." Analea ~ Kathy Cyr

I have been an Avengers fan since the middle 1960s. I grew up with them, and I've imagined a hundred different versions of an Avengers movie. I think I even have a script I wrote back in eighth grade, 'Avengers vs. the Mole Man.' Truly dreadful, but a work of love. ~ Jonathan Maberry

Nick ran smack into me.
"Ooof!" he hollered, grabbing me around the waist to keep me from falling down the rest of the staircase.
That's when I realized Mom thought Nick and I were going on a date together.
Quickly Nick let me go.He looked huge, frowning down at me from the step above. "Why are you stopping in the middle of the stairs?"
"Why are you tailgating me?"
He put his hand behind me, at butt level, without touching me. "What is that?" he demanded.
I bent a little and slapped my butt, "Something the heir to a meat fortune should know all about. USDA grade-A prime,baby." I straightened. "Just kidding. Really, it's my butt."
He put his hands on his hips, and from below I noticed his strong superhero chin again.He grumbled, "Why do you have 'boy toy' written across your butt?"
"Oh!" I put my hand over the words, realizing that I probably should have been embarrassed about this sooner. "These are my brother's jeans. He wrote it to annoy me. Or to get me a date. ~ Jennifer Echols

Debunking the myth of the 'mean girl,' new research has found that boys use relational aggression - malicious rumors, social exclusion and rejection - to harm or manipulate others more often than girls. The longitudinal study followed a cohort of students from middle to high school and found that, at every grade level, boys engaged in relationally aggressive behavior more often than girls. ~ Anonymous

What's all this nonsense about odd vision and not fitting in? There are plenty worse things in this world than not fitting in--like fitting in way too much. You strike me as a real original, Izzy Malone, in a world that loves carbon copies. If you think you beautified something, I believe you. I've never understood why folks love safe, neutral colors so much. Colors are what make this world worth living in. ~ Jenny Lundquist

The shrine I prayed at not to go to university," Sand said.
"I guess your prayer was answered," Perrotte said.
Sand strongly considered throwing something at her - but there was nothing to hand that wasn't sacred. ~ Merrie Haskell

It is hard to imagine the things you have never seen. ~ Steven J. Carroll

Flattery was the best medicine, but even I gag on medicine. ~ Jemima Pett

In terms of age, I think I've covered about as wide a range as is possible, having written everything from picture books to early chapter books to middle grade novels to YA to one adult novel - and having been editor and lead writer for a magazine for retired people! ~ Bruce Coville

I think you might be a bully, Prince Henry."
"Well, in grade school I did enjoy pulling on the girls' braids. But these days I only tug on a woman's hair in a very specific situation." His voice drops lower. "Let me know if you're like a demonstration. ~ Emma Chase

As chief, I will represent my people in many different ways and might never know which particular action is destined to matter more than another, thus, all my actions should be considered potentially important and worthy of my best effort. ~ Jennifer Frick-Ruppert

That's it, Skyco. That is the way to be a hunter. Never be in a hurry, never rush things. Wait until the prey is within your grasp, then strike swiftly and strike hard. Don't miss or it may be a long time before another opportunity appears. ~ Jennifer Frick-Ruppert

Blaise decided that the thing he would remember most about this London was the sour stink of it. The overripe foulness of the streets made him gag, and when a woman emptied a chamber pot from a top window, nearly catching him in its spray, he bent over and wretched, much to the Nightsneaks' amusement. ~ Teresa Flavin

Having fun?" said George.
"Yes, Mr Lane," said Dinkesh. "Kenny has just flown out of the window."
"That's nice," said George, banishing from his mind the thought that children as young as Kenny and Dinkesh would be daft enough to take drugs in their bedrooms. ~ Mark Gorton

What are you doing?" I asked Loretta.
"Stabbing a cushion," she told me. ~ Joel N. Ross

I'd always assumed Beth and I would be friends forever. But then in middle of the eighth grade, the Goldbergs went through the World's Nastiest Divorce.
Beth went a little nuts.
I don't blame her. When her dad got involved with this twenty-one year old dental hygienist, Beth got involved with the junk food aisle at the grocery store. She carried processed snack cakes the way toddlers carry teddy bears. She gained, like, twenty pounds, but I didn't think it was a big deal. I figured she'd get back to her usual weight once the shock wore off.
Unfortunately, I wasn't the only person who noticed.
May 14 was 'Fun and Fit Day at Surry Middle School, so the gym was full of booths set up by local health clubs and doctors and dentists and sports leagues, all trying to entice us to not end up as couch potatoes. That part was fine. What wasn't fine was when the whole school sat down to watch the eighth-grade cheerleaders' program on physical fitness. ~ Katie Alender

It's a terrible thing, isn't it? To be dragged under? ~ Guillermo Del Toro

The biggest fight in my relationship with Danny regards his absurd claim that he invited the popular middle school phenomenon of saying "cha-cha-cha" after each phrase of the Happy Birthday song- an idea his ingenious sixth-grade brain allegedly spawned in a New Jersey Chuck E. Cheese and watched spread across 1993 America with an unprecedented rapidity. ~ Marina Keegan

You've been one busy worm! ~ M.L. LeGette

P.S. Please don't call me Isabella. That name belongs to a really pretty girl who never wrecks her clothes and who never gets dirt under her fingernails. That's definitely not me. My name is Izzy. ~ Jenny Lundquist

Life outside is changing our world. We are losing our culture, loosing our roots. How can a living thing grow if its roots are cut? ~ Sherry Shahan

Magic is always impossible ... It begins with the impossible and ends with the impossible and is impossible in between. That is why it's magic. ~ Kate DiCamillo

This was the kind of woman she understood, a woman after her own cold heart. ~ Vivian French

When I grow up, maybe I will be
the first one to circle the sea.
Or maybe I will just spend all my day
doing everything my way.
Maybe I will be in a world of my own
I just hope not alone.
I just know that whatever I do
I will never, ever forget about you. ~ Oliver Neubert

There are secret passages all around you if you know where to look for them. ~ Steven J. Carroll

I grew up as a fan of the original Star Trek series. When I was in middle school, I think in the 6th grade, I remember going to a book fair and finding a book called The Making of Star Trek, by Stephen Whitfield, and I grabbed it and took and home and just devoured it, over and over again. It was a really influential book. It was very nuts and bolts. ~ Ronald D. Moore

Kiddo - here's a problem. We've got witches, we've got Evil, we've got an orphan, and we've got a kidnapping. What's the deal? ~ Vivian French

You're such a little moron, aren't you? They will hunt you down to the ends of the earth. It's nothing personal, just business. It's all about survival, dear boy." Drusilla Blackwood ~ Kathy Cyr

Where are we?" Ni asked.
"This is my work place and the center of
Universe as well." Simone said.
"Do you mean the tower is in the center of Universe?" Ni asked
"I mean that we are both in space and inside the tower at the same time."
"Why is it so dark here?" Ni asked.
"At the beginning, it is always dark." Simone replied, "Then everything comes into existence little by little.
Even Light is born out of Darkness. ~ Leora Cika Waldman

O sweet, sweet Joanna
How torn my heart!
O sweet, sweet Joanna
Our kiss shall never part!
O sweet, sweet Joanna
How thine eyes do mine miss!
O sweet, sweet Joanna
Lushest green now turned to mist!
O sweet, sweet Joanna
How wicked the under-lord king!
O sweet, sweet Joanna
Who stole our cherished ring! ~ M.L. LeGette

The horses came to an abrupt halt, jolting the children so that they were torn from their seats and flung together like trapped trout. ~ Jessica Lawson

Gaby wasn't having much luck with cats lately. The stray from yesterday had left her with red welts and a bad dream, and Lemon had just tried to eat her hair. ~ Angela Cervantes

Torque was the greatest thing in the world, as far as Lina was concerned. ~ Jaleigh Johnson

What You Missed That Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade"

Mrs. Nelson explained how to stand still and listen
to the wind, how to find meaning in pumping gas,

how peeling potatoes can be a form of prayer. She took questions
on how not to feel lost in the dark.

After lunch she distributed worksheets
that covered ways to remember your grandfather's

voice. Then the class discussed falling asleep
without feeling you had forgotten to do something else -

something important - and how to believe
the house you wake in is your home. This prompted

Mrs. Nelson to draw a chalkboard diagram detailing
how to chant the Psalms during cigarette breaks,

and how not to squirm for sound when your own thoughts
are all you hear; also, that you have enough.

The English lesson was that I am
is a complete sentence.

And just before the afternoon bell, she made the math equation look easy. The one that proves that hundreds of questions,

and feeling cold, and all those nights spent looking
for whatever it was you lost, and one person

add up to something. ~ Brad Aaron Modlin