“We loved it. We loved how slow it was. We love that it took forever. Actually, we never wanted it to end. We loved the jungle, the rafts, the ridiculous armor and helmets. . .I think most of all we loved that it didn't have a happy ending for anyone. The whole time we were sort of expecting that someone would survive because that's how stories work: Even if everything is a total disaster, someone lives to tell the tale. But not with Aguirre, the Wrath of God. Hell no. Everyone dies. That's awesome.”

“But a movie doesn't have to be good if it has Hugh Jackman.”

“Well, Greg, I think that it just means that even after somebody dies, you can... you can still keep learning about them, you know, their life. It can keep unfolding itself to you just as long... just as long as you pay attention to it.”

“I am the Thomas Edison of conversational stupidity.”

“Girls like good-looking guys, and I am not very good-looking. In fact, I sort of look like a pudding”

“He was especially excited about Aguirre, the Wrath of God. "Look at this crazy dude," he yelled, point at Klaus Kinski, who on the cover is wearing a Viking helmet and looks like a psychopath. So--with Dad's permission--we put the film in and watched it. This would turn out to be the single most important thing ever to happen in our lives.”

“We loved it. We loved how slow it was. We love that it took forever. Actually, we never wanted it to end. We loved the jungle, the rafts, the ridiculous armor and helmets. . .I think most of all we loved that it didn't have a happy ending for anyone. The whole time we were sort of expecting that someone would survive because that's how stories work: Even if everything is a total disaster, someone lives to tell the tale. But not with Aguirre, the Wrath of God. Hell no. Everyone dies. That's awesome.”

“I'm not really putting this very well. My point is this: This book contains precisely zero Important Life Lessons, or Little-Known Facts About Love, or sappy tear-jerking Moments When We Knew We Had Left Our Childhood Behind for Good, or whatever. And, unlike most books in which a girl gets cancer, there are definitely no sugary paradoxical single-sentence-paragraphs that you're supposed to think are deep because they're in italics. Do you know what I'm talking about? I'm talking about sentences like this:The cancer had taken her eyeballs, yet she saw the world with more clarity than ever before.Barf. Forget it. For me personally, things are in no way more meaningful because I got to know Rachel before she died. If anything, things are less meaningful. All right?”

“[Earl, on liking someone] Because, honestly, the rational part of me know for a rock-solid fact that I would never, ever get with Madison Hartner. But that was just the rational part of me. There's always a stupid irrational part of you, too, and you can't get rid of it. You can never completely kill off that tiny absurd spark of hope that this girl-against all odds, although she could date any guy at school, not to mention guys at college, and even though you look like the Oatmeal Monster and are a compulsive eater and suffer from constant congestion and say so many stupid things per day that it seems like a Stupid Things company is paying you to do it- this girl might like you.”