The Best Quotes from Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
Missing FSOTUS and Prince Henry? Here are the best quotes from Red, White & Royal Blue (with page numbers)!
Red, White & Royal Blue follows Alex and Henry.
Handsome and charismatic Alexander Claremont-Diaz is the First Son of the United States. And then there's His Royal Highness Prince Henry of Wales. He's full of himself, condescending and an overall pain in the arse.
When The First Son and the Prince get into a public argument that threatens the relationship between US and Britain, their teams decide it's best to set them up in a public truce to straighten things out. Their damage control works and soon Alex and Henry find their friendship growing deeper than any of them could ever imagine.
I rated Red, White & Royal Blue three stars.
I found that there were too much politics involved in it. As a non-American, the political jargon and politics, in general, were jarring to read and confusing to understand. It took me the whole book plus re-reading half of it before I realised that FSOTUS stands for First Son of the United States... why wasn't there a glossary for this?
You can find out more in my full review of Red, White & Royal Blue here.
Overall, I enjoyed the romance and the main characters, but I probably wouldn't read this one again.
Despite my average reading experience, Alex and Henry's journey was adorable to witness for the most part.
I've jotted down the quotes that captured my heart, together with the page numbers so that you can easily find them in your copy. These are based on the UK paperback edition distributed by Macmillan.
Disclaimer: This post contains spoilers for those who have not yet read the book.
Red, White & Royal Blue Quotes
They grew up made to talk about their feelings a lot, and then his mother became president, and life became less about feelings and more about international relations.
Chapter Two, Page 22.
“He has a personality of a cabbage.”
Chapter Two, Page 25.
“So Henry’s your new best friend. You will smile and nod and not piss off anyone while you and Hnery spend the weekend doing charity appearances and talking to the press about how much you love each other’s company. If somebody asks about him, I want to hear you gush like he’s your fucking prom date."
Chapter Two, Page 25.
Catchiness sells, coolness sells.
Chapter Two, Page 28.
"Sworn enemies forced to make peace to settle tensions between their countries? There's something totally Shakespearean about it."
"Shakespearean in that hopefully I'll get stabbed to death."
Chapter Two, Page 30.
“This sheet says his favourite food is mutton pie. I literally cannot think of a more boring food. He’s like a cardboard cutout of a person."
Chapter Two, Page 30.
“How can I be wrong about my own favourite? It’s a personal truth.”
“It’s a personal truth that is wrong and bad.”
“Which do you prefer, then? Please show me the error of my ways.”
Chapter Two, Page 52.
“How many times do I have to tell y’all not to discuss your murder plots in front of a sitting president? Plausible deniability. Come on.”
Chapter Three, Page 64.
do it for the gram
Chapter Three, Page 73.
I think he’s cute.
that’s because you can’t hear all the menacing gobbling
Yes, famously the most sinister of all animal sounds, the gobble.
Chapter Four, Page 77.
“Jesus Christ, it’s like they can see into your soul. Cornbread knows my sins, Henry. Cornbread knows what I have done, and he is here to make me atone.”
Chapter Four, Page 77.
“When the world seems awful, such as when you’re trapped in a Great Turkey Calamity, you can put it on and vanish into biscuit land.”
Chapter Four, Page 81.
Straight people, he thinks, probably don’t spend this much time convincing themselves they’re straight.
Chapter Five, Page 112.
He’s trying not to think too hard about what comes next. He may not have experience in practical application, but he’s done research. He has diagrams. He can do this.
Chapter Six, Page 135.
“Maybe there’s more than one dream for you, or more than one way to get there.”
Chapter Seven, Page 179.
I’ll be damned but I miss you.
Chapter Eight, Page 203.
You are a delinquent and a plague. Please come?
Chapter Eight, Page 213.
He wants to call Henry. He guesses it makes sense—they’ve always been fixed points in each other’s worlds, little magnetic poles.
Chapter Eight, Page 227.
“Someone else’s choice doesn’t change who you are.”
Chapter Eight, Page 229.
“I wanted to believe in some people being good and doing this job because they want to do good. Doing the right things most of the time and most things for the right reasons. I wanted to be the kind of person who believes in that.”
Chapter Eight, Page 229.
“Every time I see you, it takes another year off my life.”
Chapter Eight, Page 234.
“I know you’re young, but this is a forever decision. Even if you don’t stay with him forever, if people find out, that sticks with you forever. So you need to figure out if you feel forever about him.”
Chapter Nine, Page 238.
Forever. It seems like an impossibly huge word, something he’s supposed to grow into ten years from now.
Chapter Nine, Page 238.
Thinking about history makes me wonder how I’ll fit into it one day, I guess. And you too. I kinda wish people still wrote like that.
Chapter Nine, Page 241.
History, huh? Bet we could make some.
Chapter Nine, Page 241.
The phrase “see attached bibliography” is the single sexiest thing you have ever written to me.
Chapter Nine, Page 241.
Should I tell you that when we’re apart, your body comes back to me in dreams? That when I sleep, I see you, the dip of your waist, the freckle above your hip, and when I wake up in the morning, it feels like I’ve just been with you, the phantom touch of your hand on the back of my neck fresh and not imagined? That I can feel your skin against mine, and it makes every bone in my body ache? That, for a few moments, I can hold my breath and be back there with you, in a dream, in a thousand rooms, nowhere at all?
Chapter Nine, Page 242.
“I gotta be honest. I thought a prince would be more of a candy-ass.”
Chapter Nine, Page 254.
Sometimes you just jump and hope it's not a cliff.
Chapter Nine, Page 256.
He wears a key to his childhood home around his neck, but he doesn’t know the last time he actually thought about the boy who used to push it into the lock.
Chapter Nine, Page 259.
“Can’t you ever just do one thing without having to be so goddamn extra about it?”
“That is bloody rich coming from you.”
Chapter Nine, Page 260.
“I’ve been trying to be happy my entire idiot life. My birthright is a country, not happiness.”
Chapter Ten, Page 272.
“Look, I might now be a fucking royal, but I know what it’s like for your whole life to be determined by the family you were born into, okay? The lives we want—they’re not that different. Not in the ways that matter. You want to take what you were given and leave the world better than you found it. So do I. We can—we can figure out a way to do that together.”
Chapter Ten, Page 274.
“Your hair in the mornings is truly a wonder to behold.”
Chapter Ten, Page 277.
“She told me if I wasn’t a thousand percent serious about you, I needed to break things off.”
“A thousand percent?”
“Yeah, don’t let it go to your head.”
Chapter Ten, Page 282.
“I’m taking a picture of a national gay landmark,” Alex tells him. “And also a statue.”
Chapter Ten, Page 289.
At cruising altitude, he takes the chain off his neck and slides the ring on next to the old house key. They clink together gently as he tucks them both under his shirt, two homes side by side.
Chapter Ten, Page 291.
I’m there for whatever you decide you want to do, just, like, let me know if I need to start practicing gazing wistfully out the window, waiting for my love to return from the war.
Chapter Eleven, Page 296.
You see, for me, memories are difficult. Very often, they hurt. A curious thing about grief is the way it takes your entire life, all those foundational years that made you who you are, and makes them so painful to look back upon because of the absence there, that suddenly they’re inaccessible. You must invent an entirely new system.
Chapter Eleven, Page 299.
I thought, this is the most incredible thing I have ever seen, and I had better keep it a safe distance away from me. I thought, if someone like that ever loved me, it would set me on fire.
Chapter Eleven, Page 300.
And then I was a careless fool, and I fell in love with you anyway. When you rang me at truly shocking hours of the night, I loved you. When you kissed me in disgusting public toilets and pouted in hotel bars and made me happy in ways in which it had never even occurred to me that a mangled-up, locked-up person like me could be happy, I loved you.
And then, inexplicably, you had the absolute audacity to love me back. Can you believe it?
Sometimes, even now, I still can’t.
Chapter Eleven, Page 300.
Here: I can’t decide if your emails make me miss you more or less. Sometimes I feel like a funny-looking rock in the middle of the most beautiful clear ocean when I read the kinds of things you write to me. You love so much bigger than yourself, bigger than everything. I can’t believe how lucky I am to even witness it—to be the one who gets to have it, and so much of it, is beyond luck and feels like fate.
Chapter Eleven, Page 302.
Please stay gorgeous and strong and unbelievable. I miss you I miss you I miss you I love you. I’m calling you as soon as I send this, but I know you like to have these things written down.
Chapter Eleven, Page 304.
“I’m not gonna let that happen. Listen, I’m telling you right now, I will physically fight your grandmother myself if I have to, okay? And, like, she’s old. I know I can take her.”
“I wouldn’t be so cocky,” Henry says with a small laugh. “She’s full of dark surprises.”
Chapter Twelve, Page 312.
“You and me and history, remember? We’re just gonna fucking fight. Because you’re it, okay? I’m never gonna love anybody in the world like I love you. So, I promise you, one day we’ll be able to just be, and fuck everyone else.”
Chapter Twelve, Page 312.
i’ve kissed your mouth, that corner, that place is goes, so many times now. i’ve memorised it. topography on the map of you, a world i’m still charting. i know it. i added it to the key. here: inches to miles. i can multiply it out, read your latitude and longitude. recite your coordinates like la rosaria.
Chapter Twelve, Page 319.
give yourself away sometimes, sweetheart. there’s so much of you.
Chapter Twelve, Page 320.
“Priority one is damage control, not feelings.”
Chapter Twelve, Page 324.
“I am your mother. I was your mother before I was ever the president, and I’ll be your mother long after, to the day they put me in the ground and beyond this earth. You are my child.”
Chapter Thirteen, Page 327.
He hates himself, but he doesn’t regret anything, and maybe that makes him a bad person and a worse politician, but he doesn’t regret Henry.
Chapter Thirteen, Page 331.
The cocky shithead part of him is slightly pleased to finally have a claim on Henry. Yep, the prince? Most eligible bachelor in the world? British accent, face like a Greek God, legs for days? Mine.
Chapter Thirteen, Page 335.
“Sweetheart.”
“Hi, love. Are you okay?”
Chapter Thirteen, Page 337.
“That's the choice. I love him, with all that, because of all that. On purpose. I love him on purpose.”
Chapter Thirteen, Page 344.
But the truth is, also, simply this: love is indomitable.
Chapter Fourteen, Page 373.
What was your favourite quote from Red, White & Royal Blue?
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