Some series you finish and shelve, darlings, and some you finish at two in the morning with a wet face and a phone full of screenshots. The Boys of Tommen is very firmly the second kind.
Chloe Walsh wrote six books about a group of Irish teenagers in Ballylaggin, and somewhere between the rugby pitch and the absolute devastation of Joey Lynch’s story, she wrote lines that the whole of BookTok has been quoting back at each other ever since. Some of them are soft. Some of them are unbearable. A few of them are Gibsie, which is its own genre.
I’ve pulled the ones that come up again and again, sorted them by book so you can skip past anything you haven’t read yet, and added the chapter for each so you can go and find it in your own copy. Page numbers are from the Bloom Books paperbacks, so nudge them a page or two either way if you’re reading a different edition.
Quick note on the Boys of Tommen reading order
If you’ve landed here before starting the series, the order is Binding 13, Keeping 13, Saving 6, Redeeming 6, Taming 7, then Releasing 10. It matters more than usual with this one, because the timelines overlap and a good half of the emotional weight of Joey’s books comes from what you already know from Shannon’s.
Explore the full Boys of Tommen reading order guide.
Binding 13 Quotes
Book one, and the one that starts it all. Shannon Lynch arrives at Tommen College carrying more than any fifteen year old should be carrying, and Johnny Kavanagh, golden boy and school rugby captain, notices her in the way that changes everything.
The quotes from Binding 13 tend to be the gentlest in the series, which is a sentence that only makes sense once you’ve read the rest of it.
“No, no, no, Da, I’m serious,” I slurred. “I think I love that girl.”
“Well, who’s this girl?”
“She’s a river,” I sighed and closed my eyes. “I’m keeping her Da.”
“SHANNON LIKE THE RIVER. WILL YOU PLEASE BE MY FRIEND?”
“I think I need you for keeps,” he slurred. “I think I need you for keeps, too,” I confessed.”
“Boom, boom, fucking boom, Da. I’m done for…”
“I wanted to fight all her battles. I wanted to give her all her smiles and make her laugh and snatch her away from the rest of the world and keep her all to myself. I just wanted her. For keeps.”
“You are so concerned with fighting the bullies at school, Mam,” I sobbed, tears streaming down my cheeks. “When the biggest bully of them all lives under this roof.”
“I love you, Shannon like the river,”
Keeping 13 Quotes
The second half of Shannon and Johnny’s story, and the point where the series stops being a school romance and starts being something else entirely.
Everything that was simmering in book one boils over here, and Walsh writes some of her most quoted lines in the fallout.
“I want your trouble, and your complications, and everything else that comes with you.”
“I loved her more than I knew what to do with. I could see it all ahead of me: my life, my future, my career, and her. The girl I knew would play the leading role in all of it. I’d thrown it all in with her and I had no doubts. Not a single one. She was my teammate now.”
“We’re all a little fractured.”
“Don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s raining.”
“But don’t forget that you’ll always be my 13.” She sniffled and wiped my cheek with her fingers. “My binding 13.” I choked out a pained laugh, thinking about that stupid bet. “You heard about that?” “Yeah.” Half-sobbing/ half-laughing, Shannon smiled and nodded. “I won.”
“My brother,” Shannon offered weakly. “Are there any more Lynch children in my house, Jonathan?” “No,” I muttered, not meeting her eye. “I only took two.”
“I don’t just like you. I fucking—” Shaking his head, Johnny rubbed his jaw before looking back at me. “Shannon, I love you.” I stopped breathing. “You love me?” He nodded slowly, blue eyes locked on mine. “Like, a crazy fucking amount.” “Really?” “Really,” he confirmed. “And I’d ask your permission, but I didn’t even ask mine.”
Saving 6 Quotes
Joey Lynch. That’s it, that’s the section. Shannon’s older brother gets his own book and it is, by some distance, the hardest read in the series.
Joey and Aoife’s story runs alongside the first two books, so you’re watching scenes you already know from the other side, and knowing what’s coming does not help even slightly.
“You shouldn’t settle for anything less than being in love to the point of madness. The only person that you should be settling for is the person who unsettles you the most. The person who drives you to the brink of suicide because he or she makes you feel so fucking much that you can’t catch your breath or remotely function without them. And what’s more is you won’t want to. You won’t want to breathe, or feel, or fucking function without them. That’s how you’ll know that it’s a real relationshop Molloy. Only when you’re feeling the most discomfort you’ve ever felt in your entire life, should you even consider settling. Because that’s when you’ll know you’re in love, which, sounds to me, like a hell of a lot nicer way to live than settling for someone you have nothing in common with because it’s comfortable.”
“I’m not afraid of loving a boy,” I told her honestly. “I’m afraid of losing myself in one.”
“Don’t hate me, Molloy,” Joey mumbled, falling into the passenger seat the moment I let him go to open the car door. “You’re all I have to wake up for in the morning.”
“One minute I was twelve years old and locking eyes on her at the school gates, and the next I was seventeen, standing in her house, about to tell her father that she was mine.”
“Nice legs, Molloy.”
“Because I’ve put an awful lot of effort into saving you, six.”
“Molloy,” I acknowledged with a small nod. “Nice game.” “Nice legs.”
Redeeming 6 Quotes
The other half of Joey and Aoife, and the book where the series earns its reputation. Redeeming 6 is about the slow, ugly, non-linear work of getting better, and Walsh refuses to make it tidy.
The quotes reflect that. They’re less romantic and more raw than anything in the first two books.
“He sort of lives in his own world.”
“She clearly lives in that world with him.”
“Hey, stud.” “Hey, queen.”
“Because when you hurt, I hurt. When you burn, I go down in flames with you. We’re entwined, Joe. We’re mirrors. Don’t you get that by now?”
“All flowers bloom, Joe, even the late ones. And sometimes, it’s the late blooming flower that makes the biggest impact.”
“I’ll be seeing ya, Molloy. xx”
“I said no, Aoife.”
“You can’t tell me what to do, Joe,” I growled, feeling a combination of drunk and dizzy. “You don’t own me.”
“Well, that’s bad fucking luck on my account, because you sure as shit own me!”
Drunk or not, his words hit me like a wrecking ball to the chest.
Feeling the air whoosh from my lungs, I glared up at him, feeling a torrent of emotions crashing through me. “Why would you say that to me?”
“Because it’s the truth.”
“Since when?”
“Since I was twelve.”
“I’ve loved your daughter for six years,” Joey finally broke his silence by saying. “I can easily love her for another eighteen.”
Taming 7 Quotes
Gibsie and Claire, finally, after readers voted for them so overwhelmingly that Walsh moved them up the queue. Taming 7 is the funniest book in the series and also, somehow, one of the saddest, because Gerard Gibson has been carrying something the entire time and you didn’t notice because he was too busy making you laugh.
Expect the quotes here to swing wildly between complete nonsense and absolute devastation, sometimes on the same page.
“If drugs were to Joey Lynch what Claire Biggs was to me, then there was no amount of rehab that could sway me to kick the habit. Because she was the habit of my lifetime.”
“Gibsie belonged to the rest of the world. Gerard belonged just to me.”
“You’re the best friend I’ve ever had, and I love the fucking bones of you, ya mad eejit.” He choked out a pained laugh. “And if you think this is going to chase me off then you’ve another thing coming, fucker, because I’m never leaving you. Do ya hear me? Because you’re my Gibs.”
“He had darkness in his life and so much pain, but he kept the most beautiful sunny disposition about him. It was incredibly humbling to be around the boy. To know all he had endured in his short life and that he still woke up with a smile on his face in the morning.”
“And that was how I spent the rest of the evening, on Gerard Gibson’s shoulders, painting his world just a little bit brighter.”
“You’re so beautiful… I swear you shine even in the darkness.”
“The sky was blue outside.
The birds were out.
The sun was shining.
It was another blissful day.
And I wanted to scream”
Releasing 10 Quotes
Hughie and Lizzie, and the most recent book in the series. Lizzie Young has spent the whole series being the loud one, and Releasing 10 finally shows you what that costs her.
Newer, so fewer of these lines have made it into the BookTok canon yet, which is exactly why this section is worth having.
“Because I knew deep down inside that I would sit with Lizzie Young for the rest of my life if it kept the sadness out of her eyes. If it kept her safe.”
“I’ll be here.” I kissed her again. “Always.” “No matter what?” “Yeah, Liz.” I kissed her softly. “No matter what.”
“Hey, Lizzie?” “Yeah, Gibs?” “You sure you’re okay?” “Yep.” Smiling, I reached up and brushed a tear from his cheek. “I’m always okay, Gibs.”
“I don’t think I like you, Lizzie Young.” He looked out the window when he whispered, “I know I do.”
“Shivering violently, I watched him kiss my shame away. Because those scars on my wrists depicted the ugliest parts of my mind. But Hugh kissed each one like they were beautiful. Like I was beautiful. Like I was still me.”
“There’s no such thing as normal, Liz. It doesn’t exist. It’s just a word someone invented to make everyone behave the exact same way so they can tick the exact same boxes.”
Boys of Tommen Quotes by Character
These are some of the most popular quotes from each character:
Johnny Kavanagh
“Boom, boom, fucking boom….
I’m done for.”
Shannon Lynch
“If my parents’ relationship was a representation of love, then I wanted no part of it.”
Joey Lynch
“Nice legs”
Aoife Molloy
“Because you might not love yourself, but I do. I love you enough for the both of us”
Gibsie
“I have a feeling that I’m gonna marry her.”
Claire Biggs
“Gerard! Your cat is shitting in my bathtub!”
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s)
Six, as of now: Binding 13, Keeping 13, Saving 6, Redeeming 6, Taming 7 and Releasing 10. Chloe Walsh has confirmed the series isn’t finished, so more are coming.
Yes. The timelines overlap heavily, and Joey’s books in particular assume you already know what happened in Shannon’s.
No, and this catches people out. The Bloom Books, Piatkus and original self-published editions all paginate differently. That’s why every quote here has a chapter reference as well.
A group of teenagers at an elite rugby school in Cork, Ireland, in the early 2000s, and what they survive together. It’s romance, but it’s also about addiction, abuse, recovery and found family, and it does not soften any of it.
It builds. The early books are relatively tame, and the later ones are noticeably more explicit. Roughly three chillies across the series overall.
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