The City of Ember Friendship Quotes

Because clearly, you should treat your best friend as if their misfortunes might be contagious. We get that Assignment Day is a stressful time for kids (since the luck of the draw will determine the job they work for the next three years), but you'd think that a friend would want to comfort their buddy who'd just gotten some bad news.

Sometimes friendships just kind of fade away. Sure, no one wants it to happen, but it totally does. In the case of Lina and Doon, a silly accident where she laughs at him when he feels humiliated is the cause for them splitting. Maybe you've been in a similar position before, where common sense loses out to pride, at the cost of friendship?

Arlin isn't too friendly to Doon on his first day in the Pipeworks, but apparently she does have friends of her own among the Pipeworks laborers. It makes sense that coworkers would befriend each other, especially when they're in a dank and dangerous environment like the Pipeworks. The more people who have your back down there, the better.

Clary is older than Lina. We don't know by how much, but we do know that Clary worked at the greenhouses with Lina's father, who's been dead for around two years. So it's kinda neat that Clary and Lina are friends even though there's an obvious age difference between the two. We're thinking it'd be kinda boring to only have friends who are your same age, or who are exactly like you in other respects.

Lizzie is way more interested in what she has to say than what Lina wants to share with her, which is kind of a bummer given that they're supposed to be best friends. We get that not every friendship will be 100% symmetrical in terms of who gives what, but still. You'd think Lizzie could at least make an effort to pay attention to what Lina wants to show her.

Thanks, Lizzie, for showing us that friends exist to alleviate your boredom. That's totally their purpose, right? And is it just us, or does she come across as insincere when she's saying goodbye to Lina?

Lina's not really alone after Granny dies, but dealing with death is such a serious thing, it kind of feels that way. To Lina, having friends is proof that she's not alone in the world. Why friends? Well, she doesn't have any family left except for Poppy, so there's that. Also, to a kid (remember, Lina's twelve), it can seem like friends are your world, or at least your social world.

We're getting the picture that Lina's a pretty considerate friend. She'll listen to Lizzie's nervous ramblings, and her first thought after Lizzie falls is to ask whether Lizzie is okay. In response, Lizzie tries to pick up her stolen goods as fast as she can, so that no one will notice them. Good game plan, Lizzie. Let's see how you feel about your friends when your illicit canned goods run out and you're left alone and hungry.

It's a nice side effect of all this mystery and conspiracy that Lina and Doon become friends again. And since they're older than the first time around (when they were friends in grade school), their friendship seems more real, more substantial. It's like if you were forced by your parents to take piano lessons when you were a kid, but later in life, you took up the piano again because you discovered that you really love it. Friendship should be a choice, something freely entered into, don't you think?

For Doon's famous temper to cool down quickly, replaced with concern for Lina, shows how much their friendship has grown. It must be a universal rule of friendship: don't let the bad guys capture your friend if you can help it. Yeah, that sounds about right.