Powerful closing lines from literature

If you are an avid reader you will likely recall these closing lines from novels. Enjoy this memorable list curated by the Goeread review team.

"Valcourt is at peace with himself."

A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali, Gil Courtemanche

"'When the day shall come, that we do part,' he said softly, and turned to look at me, 'if my last words are not ‘I love you’ – ye’ll ken it was because I didna have time.'"

The Fiery Cross, Diana Gabaldon

"She closes her eyes again and I begin to sing softly:

'''V'la l'bon vent, v'la l'joli vent

V'la l'bon vent, ma mie m'appelle.'''

Hoping that this time it will remain a lullaby. That this time the wind will not hear. That this time - please just this once - it will leave without us."

Chocolat, Joanne Harris

"The knife came down, missing him by inches, and he took off."

Catch-22, Joseph Heller

"I lingered round them, under that benign sky; watched the moths fluttering among the heath, and hare-bells; listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass; and wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet slumbers, for the sleepers in that quiet earth."

Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte

"His body stirs beneath the sheets. He twists his head from one side to the other. His eyes, she sees, are open. Then she feels a pressure on her hand and he speaks his first words for a week. 'Keep going, El,' he says, 'Keep going.' And so she does."

The Hand That First Held Mine, Maggie O'Farrell

''I never saw any of them again — except the cops. No way has yet been invented to say goodbye to them."

The Long Goodbye, Raymond Chandler

"She watched as Sandy Forsyth walked across the talmac towards them, smiling like an eager curious schoolboy as he lifted his face to the sunny English afternoon."

Winter in Madrid, C. J. Sansom

"I went on my way. A stormy wind rattled the scrap-iron in the ruins, whistling and howling through the charred cavities of the windows. Twilight came on. Snow fell from the darkening, leaden sky."

The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945, Wladyslaw Szpilman

"This is not a full circle. It's Life carrying on. It's the next breath we all take. It's the choice we make to get on with it."

Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood, Alexandra Fuller

"Yes, they will trample me underfoot, the numbers marching one two three, four hundred million five hundred six, reducing me to specks of voiceless dust, just as, in all good time, they will trample my son who is not my son, and his son who will not be his, and his who will not be his, until the thousand and first generation, until a thousand and one midnights have bestowed their terrible gifts and a thousand and one children have died, because it is the privilege and the curse of midnight’s children to be both masters and victims of their times, to forsake privacy and be sucked into the annihilating whirlpool of the multitudes, and to be unable to live or die in peace."

Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

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