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Blood is thicker than water. That's what they say. But in truth, most things are. -- Libba Bray
don't. I don't know about you, but if I'm gonna be chained to a rock by the gods, I'd rather go out as the person who brought fire back from the mountain than as a pure princess who didn't have the sense to say to everyone, "Oh, hell no, you are not sacrificing me to some sea monster! -- Libba Bray
Jericho lay back down on his side, watching her breathe just an arm's length from him. She was not beautiful while she slept; her mouth hung open and she snored very lightly, and this, despite everything that had happened, made him smile. -- Libba Bray
Yes, go on. Leave. You're always coming and going. The rest of us are stuck here. Do you think he'd still love you if he knew who you are? He doesn't really care - only when it suits him. -- Libba Bray
I'm going to eviscerate you and leave your organs on a pike in the yard as a warning to those who wear large jewelry. -- Libba Bray
'The Catcher in the Rye.' When I was a teenager, that was my book; yes, somebody gets it, somebody gets adolescence. -- Libba Bray
The night's chilly breath tickles up my neck and finds my ear, whispering secrets only the wind knows. -- Libba Bray
She smiled as sweetly as a show poster for the glorified, all-American Ziegfeld girl just before dumping her second cigarette into Wally's fresh cup of coffee. -- Libba Bray
People tend to think that hate is the most dangerous emotion. But love is equally dangerous," Will said. "There are many stories of spirits haunting the places and people who meant the most to them. In fact, there are more of those than there are revenge stories. -- Libba Bray
God save me from a woman's tears, for I've no strength against them. -- Libba Bray
There are times when I wish I could go back and change the course of my life. Make different choices ... But the past cannot be changed, and we carry our choices with us, forward, into the unknown. We can only move on. Do you remember that I told you that at Spence? -- Libba Bray
No, I call. Come back.
I'm here, he says.
But I can't see. It's too bright.
You can't hold back the light, Gemma. I'm here. Trust me. -- Libba Bray
She is the elephant's eyebrows," Evie whispered appreciatively. "Those jewels! How her neck must ache."
"That's why Bayer makes aspirin," Mabel whispered back, and Evie smiled, knowing that even a socialist wasn't immune to the dazzle of a movie star. -- Libba Bray
The uncertainty of our future is nothing more than a fog of breath on a windowpane. -- Libba Bray
When it is time for me to visit Brigid, I find her awake in her little room. "That's awl righ', luv. I don' care to forget, if it's all the same," she says, and there are no rowan leaves at her window anymore. -- Libba Bray
No, instead it is the beastly Cecily Temple who answers me. Dead, dear Cecily, or as I affectionately refer to her in the privacy of my mind, She Who Inflicts Misery Simply by Breathing. -- Libba Bray
Ohmigosh. No food at all." Tiara sank down on the sand as if the full weight of their predicament had finally hit her. She blinked back tears. And then that megawatt smile that belonged on cereal boxes across the nation reappeared. "I am going to be so superskinny by pageant time! -- Libba Bray
Evie wanted to cry. From fear. From exhaustion, yes. But mostly from the cruel uselessness, the damned stupid arbitrariness of it all. -- Libba Bray
Any book that can help you survive the slings and arrows of adolescence is a book to love for life; 'The Catcher in the Rye' did just that, and I still do love it. -- Libba Bray
I've been poked and prodded in places I'd always prided myself on keeping untouched for that one special doctor who gives me a ring and a promise someday. -- Libba Bray
We don't look at each other anymore. Not really. Not since I pulled him from that opium den. Now when I look at him, I see the addict. And when he looks at me, he sees what he would rather not remember. I wish I could be his adored little girl again, sitting at his side. -- Libba Bray
Centuries of fighting, and for what? I say. Today it ends. I can't live in fear any longer. I've cursed this power. I've both enjoyed and misused it. And I've hidden it away. Now I must try to wield it correctly, to marry it to a purpose and hope that is enough. -- Libba Bray
You couldn't be perfect enough to keep the world from betraying you. -- Libba Bray
But aren't many gardens beautiful because they are imperfect? ... aren't the strange, new flowers that arise by mistake or misadventure as pleasing as the well-tended and planned? -- Libba Bray
The beast attempts a beautific look that could be mistaken for a bout of painful wind. -- Libba Bray
They would place their hands together inside the circle so that they could walk in each other's dreams. It forged a bond that could not be broken. The circle represents love in eternity. For there is no beginning and no end.
-- Libba Bray
I'm a wild girl from a cursed line of women. I paw at the ground and run under the moon. I like the feel of my own body. I'm not a slut or a nympho or someone who's just asking for it. And if I talk too loud it's just that I'm trying to be heard. -- Libba Bray
Chasing after words like trying to grab the tails of comets. -- Libba Bray
These are hard times. The world hurts. We live in fear and forget to walk with hope. But hope has not forgotten you. So ask it to dinner. It's probably hungry and would appreciate the invitation. -- Libba Bray
Miss McCleethy stands to address us. "Thank you, Miss Bradshaw. That was a nice start to our day."
A nice start? It was lovely. Perfect, in fact. Miss McCleethy has no passion at all, I decide. I shall be forced to give her two bad conduct marks in my invisible ledger. -- Libba Bray
The world expected girls to pluck and primp and put on heels. Meanwhile, boys dressed in rumpled T-shirts and baggy pants and misplace their combs, and yet you were suppose to fall at their feet? Unacceptable. -- Libba Bray
I'm not interested in being polite. It's false. -- Libba Bray
Oh, I've a love, a true, true love, who waits upon yon shore ... and if my love won't be my love, then I will live no more ... -- Libba Bray
You are working up to Mr. Fantastic Fiction levels of Zombie Expert, which is like playing Guitar Hero on some level that actually melts the guitar controller, burning your fingers with searing hot plastic till you scream in pain. Only with words. And zombies. -- Libba Bray
Sometimes when Sam's pretending to be in love with me, my stomach does funny things."
"Well, get some milk of magnesia and stop it. -- Libba Bray
Maybe that's what real friendship is
getting so used to people that you need to be annoyed by them. -- Libba Bray
You can't blame a fella for kissing the prettiest girl in New York, can you, sister?" Sam's grin was anything but apologetic.
Evie brought up her knee quickly and decisively, and he dropped to the floor like a grain sack. "You can't blame a girl for her quick reflexes now, can you, pal? -- Libba Bray
I told him Friday was a different religious occasion: Doctor Who. Hey, it's not my fault they don't have TiVo yet. -- Libba Bray
Did they find something wanting in you, Gemma, at the party? You didn't speak too freely or behave ... strangely?
I grew claws and bayed at the moon. I confessed that I eat the hearts of small children. I told them I like the French. -- Libba Bray
Who the heck is Don Quick-oats? -- Libba Bray
I am staring into the hissing face of a cobra. A surprisingly pink tongue slithers in and out of a cruel mouth while an Indian man whose eyes are the blue of blindless inclines his head towards my mother and explains in Hindi that cobras make very good eating. -- Libba Bray
I'm Sorry,' he says. It's simple and direct, with none of the nonsense about God calling home an angel too young and who are we to question his mysterious ways. -- Libba Bray
A guy's gotta live, you know, gotta make his way and find his meaning in life and love, and to do that he needs coffee, he needs coffee and coffee and coffee. -- Libba Bray
Besides, things you loved deeply could be lost in a second, and then there was no filling the hole left inside you. So she lived in the moment, as if her life were one long party that never had to stop as long as she kept the good times going. -- Libba Bray
It's knowing I'll never have what she has
a beauty so powerful it brings things to you. I fear I will always have to chase things I want. I'll always have to wonder whether I'm truly wanted or whether I've just been settled for. -- Libba Bray
You know, people, just being beautiful isn't enough."
Tiara looked confused. "But ... it always has been. -- Libba Bray
I am for hockey. I find I should like to hit something with a stick.
-Gemma Doyle Trilogy -- Libba Bray
If this were a movie, I would bust a secret move so fierce the entire place would be razed to the ground. I'd finish with something snappy like "And don't forget my soda, punk" while I strolled off into the night. -- Libba Bray
How do people stay in love, anyway? Is it a choice? Or is it like those plants we studied in biology that mutate into something new and totally different but are still part of the same plant family? -- Libba Bray
However, it has come to our attention that there is a small safety "glitch" with the Git R Done 447, which might cause it to fire too soon or even randomly, accidentally killing someone you love. Awkward, we know. -- Libba Bray
I understand we'll be attending your friend Miss Worthington's Christmas ball. Perhaps I'll find a suitable
which is to say wealthy
wife among the ladies attending.
And perhaps they will run screaming for the convent. -- Libba Bray
She never utters a sound even when she's crying, and that makes me a little sad. Doesn't seem right. When you cry, people should hear you. The world should stop. -- Libba Bray
Time has no meaning. I feel as if I have been left in the desert to die and am eagerly awaiting the vultures to begin their work and end my misery. -- Libba Bray
Just once I'd like to meet a fella who isn't a phony. Somebody who doesn't wanna buy me a fur so he can show me off to his boys. -- Libba Bray
Travel opens your mind as few other things do. -- Libba Bray
When you live in Brooklyn, if you throw a rock, you'll hit a writer - Jonathan Safran Foer, Jonathan Lethem, Paul Auster. -- Libba Bray
I miss Latin. So much fun
all those exciting verbs that don't come until the end of the sentence. It's like a movie trailer for language. -- Libba Bray
A gentle breeze catches in the branches then and I hear it, soft and low, a murmured prayer
Gem-ma, Gem-ma
and then the leaves bend down and trail delicate fingers across my cold cheeks. -- Libba Bray
And please, stay away from those books you devour. They are putting the most fantastical tales into your head. -- Libba Bray
I am not asking you to understand, Papa. I'm asking for you to accept."
"Accept what?"
Me. Accept me, Papa. "My decision to live my own life as I see fit."
It is so quiet that I suddenly wish I could take it back. Sorry, it was only a terrible joke. I should like a new dress, please. -- Libba Bray
We're all damaged, somehow. -- Libba Bray
Creostus's booming laugh leaves gooseflesh upon my arms. He paces close to me. "Jealous, Priestess? Do you wish to compete for my affections? I should like to see that." "I'm sure you would. But you will die first and so let us journey to Philon, if you please. -- Libba Bray
It is all I can do not to confide to the girl closest to me: "If I should die during tea - asphyxiated by my own corset - please do not let them bury me in such a hideous dress or I shall come back to haunt you. -- Libba Bray
Our days are numbered in the book of days, Most High," Gorgon murmurs as the garden comes once more into view. "That is what gives them sweetness and purpose. -- Libba Bray
Because really, sometimes the irony gods just get drunk. -- Libba Bray
We all walk in a land of dreams. For what are we but atoms and hope, a handful of stardust and sinew? We are weary travelers trying to find our way home on a road that never ends. Am I a part of your dream? or are you but a part of mine? -- Libba Bray
It is the taste of forgetting. Of sleep and dreams with no waking. Never to long or yearn, to struggle or hurt or love or desire ever again. And I understand that this is what it truly means to lose your soul. -- Libba Bray
There are no safe choices. Only other choices. -- Libba Bray
Chin held high, Miss Ohio beamed at an imagined crowd. "I want to be a motivational speaker."
"What are you going to motivate people to do?"
Smile still in place, she cut her eyes at Adina. "You know. Motivational ... stuff. -- Libba Bray
I wouldn't marry you if you were the last man on earth."
"If I were the last man on earth it'd be because you drove the other poor suckers to early graves. -- Libba Bray
Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Felicity and Ann hunched over their ornaments as if they were fascinating relics from an archaeological dig. I note that their shoulders are trembling, and I realize that they are fighting laughter over my terrible plight. There's friendship for you. -- Libba Bray
So much of the literature we had to read for high school English class was filled with victimized, tragic, symbolic women who spurred the plot forward with their inevitable shunning/death/shunning-followed-by-pregnancy-followed-by-death timelines. -- Libba Bray
The world's most bada** Viking yard gnome is on the counter by the cash register using a dinner plates as a shield and a steak knife as a sword -- Libba Bray
My joke is that my father was a minister and my mother was an English teacher, so I'm trained to see the world in terms of symbols, which is hard when you just want to make toast. -- Libba Bray
To each his own magic. -- Libba Bray
When the world moves forward too fast for some people, they try to pull us all back with their fear. -- Libba Bray
We're all looking glasses, we girls, existing only to reflect their images back to them as they'd like to be seen. Hollow vessels of girls to be rinsed of our own ambitions, wants, and opinions, just waiting to be filled with the cool, tepid water of gracious compliance. -- Libba Bray
Robot. Is. Sad. Because silly bitch. Will. Not. Dance. -- Libba Bray
Welcome to finishing school, Gemma. Learn to embroider, serve tea, curtsy. Oh, and by the way, you might be demolished in the night by a hideous winged creature from the roof. -- Libba Bray
The face staring back at me isn't beautiful but she isn't something that would scare the horses, either. -- Libba Bray
There is a time in every life when paths are chosen, character is forged. I could have chosen a different path. But I didn't. I failed myself. -- Libba Bray
The rules of magic, my dear, are best not discusses. For once we understand the illusion, we no longer believe it. -- Libba Bray
I am starting a collection of only right-hand gloves. It's ever so bourgeois to have two. -- Libba Bray
My aunt says you should only pray to Jesus."
Blind Bill grunted and spat. "You think the white folks' god is gonna help you? You think he's on our side?"
"I don't think anybody's god is on our side. -- Libba Bray
Weren't you wearing a purity ring when we got here? Aren't you supposed to be saving yourself?" Shanti asked.
"Yeah," Mary Lou answered. "And then I thought, for what? You save leftovers. My sex is not a leftover, and it is not a Christmas present. -- Libba Bray
Adina sat up. "It's denigrating and objectifying."
"No. It's eye shadow and lipstick and sex and mystery and magic and transformation and fun. And nobody's taking that away from me. You will pry my Petal Power lip gloss out of my cold, dead hands," Shanti insisted. -- Libba Bray
Ann turns to me. I know she's waiting for some hint of kindness-a kiss, an embrace, even a smile. But I can't muster any of it.
"You'll make a fine governess." My words are like a slap.
"I know," she answers, a slap of her own. -- Libba Bray
I have seen what a handful of girls can do. They can hold back an army if necessary, so please don't tell me it isn't possible. -- Libba Bray
It was a kiss small in its ministrations but epic in its feeling. -- Libba Bray
Oh, I didn't think it wise to hide it. Might not be able to find it again," I say, cheerily. "It's sitting in plain view on your chair in the great hall. I do hope that was the best place for it. -- Libba Bray
I love to be scared. Not, 'Hey, I think I smell smoke ... ' scared, but creepy, paranoid, what's-that-out-there-in-the-dark, ghost story scared. It's no surprise that I was the girl who got invited to the slumber parties because I could be counted on to tell a tale to scare the bejesus out of you. -- Libba Bray
Yes, fine," I say, feeling dead inside. They don't know what they're in for at Spence, getting me, a ghost of a girl who'll nod and smile and take her tea who isn't really here. -- Libba Bray
They don't know what they're in for at Spence, getting me, a ghost of a girl who'll nod and smile and take her tea but who isn't really here. -- Libba Bray
Sometimes, Johannes would pop his head in the filing room and ask, "Need anything?"
'Yes. I would like you to ravage me here on the floor and swear your undying love to me.'"No. Thanks. I'm good. -- Libba Bray
I will never, ever drink whiskey again. From now on, it's strictly sherry. -- Libba Bray
Around us the night creatures have their say. We are surrounded by a symphony of crickets and frogs. Neither of us feels the need to speak, and I suppose that is one of the qualities I find comforting in Kartik. We can be alone together. -- Libba Bray
You're not a man. You're their lackey. I don't care about you, or your brother, or your ridiculous organization. From now on, I shall do exactly as I wish and you cannot stop me. Do not follow. Do not watch. Do not even attempt to contact me or you'll be sorry indeed. Do you understand? -- Libba Bray
I should never be left alone with my mind for too long. -- Libba Bray
She loved attention. It was like a glass of the best champagne - bubbly and intoxicating - and as with champagne, she always wanted more of it. Still, she didn't want to seem like an easy mark.
"If you must know, I've come to join a convent," Evie said, testing him. -- Libba Bray
One could argue that it's romantic to die for love. Of course, then you're dead and unable to take that honeymoon trip to the Alps with all the other fashionable young couples, which is a shame. -- Libba Bray
And afterward, in the small cabin, they'd do this, this tangle of bodies, this blurring of the edges that kept people distant and lonely. -- Libba Bray
I don't know. Sometimes, I feel nothing, and I'm so afraid. Afraid I'll stop feeling anything at all. I'll just slip away inside myself ... I just need to feel something A Great and Terrible Beauty, Page 177, by -- Libba Bray
I'm from the health department. You've heard of Typhoid Mary? This fella's got enough typhoid to start his own colony. -- Libba Bray
Naughty John, Naughty John, does his work with his apron on. Cuts your throat and takes your bones, sells 'em off for a coupla stones. -- Libba Bray
Didn't you have any sadistic nannies who told you these tales to keep you quiet and well behaved at night? Heavens, what's to become of the Empire if governesses have lost their touch for scaring the wits out of their girls? -- Libba Bray
But forgiveness ... I'll hold on to that fragile slice of hope and keep it close, remembering that in each of us lie good and bad, light and dark, art and pain, choice and regret, cruelty and sacrifice. -- Libba Bray
We're still expected to color within the lines of accepted femininity, and women who step out of those lines are usually attacked, whether verbally or physically. -- Libba Bray
I feel like I swallowed a Magritte. Like on the inside, I'm made of clouds and floating eyes, green apples, and slowly rising men in bowler hats. -- Libba Bray
HI. I'm from Arkansas, the cantaloupe state. And tonight, I hope you will hold my melons close to your heart and vote me your Miss Teen Dream. -- Libba Bray
She has a scent that is familiar and comforting, like all the things you wish you could take with you on your travels to make you feel less alone. -- Libba Bray
Hey," the cabbie yelled. "How's about a tip?"
"You bet-ski," Evie said, heading toward the old Victorian mansion, her long silk scarf trailing behind her. "Don't kiss strange men in Penn Station. -- Libba Bray
She's right. I don't trust her farther than I can run full-steam in a corset, but she's right. The truth is hard and unfair, but there it is. -- Libba Bray
Sam. Don't make me kill you on a full stomach. I might get a cramp. -- Libba Bray
Life is too short not to be who you are -- Libba Bray
What kind of person doesn't let you have gummi bears? -- Libba Bray
There are no girl books. There are no boy books. There are just books. -- Libba Bray
Fashionable debutantes in pastel chiffon party dresses wilt into leather club chairs like frosted petit fours melting under the July sun. -- Libba Bray
I should rather take my chances with the lions of Rome's ancient Colosseum than endure another tea chat with the likes of them. At least the lions are honest about their desire to eat you and make no effort to hide it. -- Libba Bray
I do have to wonder what sort of childhood the Grimm brothers endured. They are not a merry bunch of storytellers, what with their children roasted by witches, maidens poisoned by old crones, and whatnot. -- Libba Bray
Why had this power come to me? I can scarcely govern myself. At times, I feel as if I could dance through the halls with happiness, and then, just as suddenly, my thoughts are dark and lost and frightening. -- Libba Bray
Do not be tempted by English roses. Their beauty fades, but their thorns are forever. -- Libba Bray
I thought I was having an existential crisis, but it was nothing.
Please don't tailgate: body in trunk. -- Libba Bray
But as soon as the thought enters my mind, another one swims in and eats the first one like a shark. Fuck that, it burps. -- Libba Bray
She insisted on Knight for her last name. It made her feel strong and bold. A name of armor. For she would defend herself in this new life. -- Libba Bray
Cash or check?" he said cheekily. Even the dullest Ohio girls knew that bit of lingo: Kiss now or kiss later?
"Bank's closed, pal. -- Libba Bray
You set fire to my house, killed my family, and ate my dog. But steal my boyfriend? That's a step too far. -- Libba Bray
I have met the devil, and her name is Cecily Temple -- Libba Bray
Could I have a Sloe Gin Fizz, without the gin?"
"What's the point of that, Miss?" the waiter said.
"Tomorrow morning," Mabel said. -- Libba Bray
Our mouths and bodies speak for us in a new language as the trees shake loose a rain of petals that stick to our slickness like skins we will wear forever. And just like that, I am changed. -- Libba Bray
She's no beauty, mate -- Libba Bray
What if evil doesn't really exist? What if evil is something dreamed up by man, and there is nothing to struggle against except out own limitations? The constant battle between our will, our desires, and our choices? -- Libba Bray
When I dream, I dream of him. For several nights now he's come to me, waving from a distant shore as if he's been waiting patiently for me to arrive. He doesn't utter a word, but his smile says everything: I've missed you. -- Libba Bray
Beliefs converge and become something new all the time. -- Libba Bray
I can see his pain, see it in the way he runs his fingers through his hair, over and over, and I understand what it costs him to hide it all. -- Libba Bray
Adina appealed to the sky. "We asked for rescue and you sent us incompetent rockstar pirates with a broken ship and perfect abs?"
"Thank you, God," Petra said. -- Libba Bray
The wolf was at the door. His shadow spilled into the room, taking it over. -- Libba Bray
We're never prepared for how much we love our children, for how much we wish we could protect them by being perfect. -- Libba Bray
Discord need not be an impediment. Differences can bring strength. -- Libba Bray
Please, I'm a transgender former boy-bander. You think I don't know how to defend myself? -- Libba Bray
No? Part girl, part wolf? Do they lick their butter knives? -- Libba Bray
Corrupt my brother, will you? I'll see you in hell first, sir. -- Libba Bray
Okay. That's fair. Abso-tive-ly fair. Let's say the tables were turned. If I were about to walk off a cliff, what would you do?"
Evie pursed her lips. "Push?"
"I don't believe that."
"You would on the way down. -- Libba Bray
- 'Music opens your soul, makes you ready.'
- 'Ready for what?'
- He smiles big. 'Exactly. -- Libba Bray
If God has nothing better to do than punish schoolgirls for a bit of tomfoolery, then I've no use for God. -- Libba Bray
I had thought Felicity dangerous a moment ago, when she felt powerful. I was wrong. Wounded and powerless, she is more dangerous than I could imagine. -- Libba Bray
Will you punish me forever? -- Libba Bray
From the elevator, Mabel watched the old woman's bare feet hobbling away, a trail of salt and the lace hem of her nightgown left in her wake like sea foam. -- Libba Bray
Dead bodies are such trouble, Evie said with a little sigh, and Mabel had to turn her head away so as not to laugh. -- Libba Bray
I'm floating inside my skin. I could go on floating like this for days. Right now, the real world with its heartbreak and disappointments is just a pulse against the protective membrane we've drunk ourselves into. It's somewhere outside us, waiting. A Great and Terrible Beauty, Page 141, by -- Libba Bray
You evah hear of a magic screw?'
I cough back a laugh. 'No. No, sir. -- Libba Bray
Kartik feels like a country I want to travel - vast, dangerous, and unknown. -- Libba Bray
Ain't that a sight? With all the things we know and learn, we still ain't touched the big mysteries
where we come from, where we go next, why we even her. And when something truly miraculous happens, we run and hide in our caves. We deny. -- Libba Bray
We're all damaged somehow.-A Great and Terrible Beauty -- Libba Bray
The dark does not weep for itself because there is no light. Rather, it accepts that it is the dark. -- Libba Bray
I've never been in love. I will die without knowing what it feels like to need to see one person's face when you go to sleep at night, to crave seeing it when you wake up. I wish I knew. -- Libba Bray
Helloooo." Miss Ohio rolled her eyes. "I'm from the Buckeye State. We are serious about our tailgating parties. I can turn anything into a grill. -- Libba Bray
They're too tired for bathing, but they're not too tired for dreams. For dreams, too, are ghosts, desires chased in sleep, gone by morning. The longing of dreams draws the dead, and the city hall to many dreams. -- Libba Bray
No historians or librar ians were harmed in the making of this book, but some were badgered extensively with questions. -- Libba Bray
Her eyes take on that suspicious, wounded look girls get when they know they've fallen off the top rung of friendship and someone else has passed them, but they don't know when or how the change took place. -- Libba Bray
Adina gave a little shriek. "That fish just swam past my leg! Creepy! Where did it go?"
"To your right! Two o'clock! Get it!"
"You are officially the most bloodthirsty vegetarian ever. -- Libba Bray
I changed my mind. I don't want to be an inveshtigative journalist anymore. I want to be a professional rum drinker."
"There are people who do that," Duff said. He'd barely sipped his rum.
"Really? What do you call them?"
"Alcoholics. -- Libba Bray
What do I want? Why is that simple question - four little words - so impossible to answer? -- Libba Bray
People will believe anything if it means they can go on with their lives and not have to think too hard about it. -- Libba Bray
Greetings, ax murderer! I was just wondering how you like your eggs? -- Libba Bray
Just because you're funny doesn't mean you get to be cruel. -- Libba Bray
No. It is impossible to maintain a smile in my brother's presence. Monks haven't the sort of patience required. -- Libba Bray
We have work to do if you are not to be a total failure like high-waisted, acid-wash jeans. -- Libba Bray
It keeps her purity vacum-sealed to preserve its freshness for her future husband. -- Libba Bray
It was a machine that required constant feeding- Henry hated the machine, and he hated himself for wanting the sort of admiration it promised, as if he had no worth unless someone was there to applaud it -- Libba Bray
Harold Brodie is a louse and a lothario who cheats at cards and has a different girl in his rumble seat every week. That coupe of his is pos-i-tute-ly a petting palace. And he's a terrible kisser to boot."
Evie's parents stared in stunned silence.
"Or so I've heard. -- Libba Bray
There is never any turning back Gemma. You have to go forward. Make the future yours. -- Libba Bray
Gemma~Was he really looking at me that way?
Kartik~What way?
Gemma~Like a piece of ripe fruit?
Katrik~You'd best be on your guard with him. -- Libba Bray
Evie winked at Sam and he whispered low in her ear, making her neck tingle. Sister, together, we could be a hell of a team. -- Libba Bray
True affection and love have a purity which shall always prevail over bigotry. -- Libba Bray
Beauty, grace, and charm my foot. It's a school for sadists with good tea-serving skills. -- Libba Bray
I can't help feeling humiliated for Ithal. He stands at the wall and watches us go, and when we reach the turnoff for the school, he's still there with the mangled flower in his hands, far behind us a small, dying star fading out of our constellation. -- Libba Bray
All the small, simple, conscious acts of living a sudden defense against the dying we do every day. -- Libba Bray
Dude, this is a stoner conversation and we're not even high -- Libba Bray
The best day of my life happened when I was five and almost died at Disney World. I'm sixteen now, so you can imagine that's left me with quite a few days of major suckage. -- Libba Bray
I've spent the last two hours worried that you were bleeding to death in a ditch," Evie continued. "Now that I know you're okay, I just want you to be bleeding to death in a ditch."
"Aww, Lamb Chop, you missed me. -- Libba Bray
I hear they feed you in Sing Sing," Evie muttered. "Three squares a day."
"Evangeline," Will said with a sigh. "Charity begins at home."
"So does mental illness. -- Libba Bray
But ... you could have whatever you wished."
"Exactly," he says, nuzzling my neck.
"But," I say, "you could turn stones to rubies or ride in a fine gentleman's carriage."
Kartik puts his hands on either side of my face. "To each his own magic," he says and kisses me again. -- Libba Bray
Oh, honey, of course it hurts! Beauty is pain. But you don't want to look like a troll, do you? -- Libba Bray
And she wanted so much to make him happy that she forgot how to make herself happy"
"That is not happiness. That is kind of murder, yeah? -- Libba Bray
See, now I don't know whether to be all 'Yay!' because you're empowered or sad because you're having delusional almost-sex with an imaginary boyfriend. -- Libba Bray
Does my new feminism make me look fat? -- Libba Bray
My dad was a Presbyterian minister. Yes, I am one of those dreaded P.K.s - Preacher's Kids. Be afraid. -- Libba Bray
They swoon over Tom, who preens for them, bowing, which sets them to blushing and giggling.
God help us all. -- Libba Bray
I love you for who you are, not for who the world thinks you should be. -- Libba Bray
Ain't that the way of the world, now? Good luck turns bad. Bad luck turns good. Just a big rolling craps game played between this world and the next, and we the dice getting tossed around. -- Libba Bray
He loved her very much. She inspired his work. He used to say, 'There is no meaning but what we assign to life, and she is my meaning. -- Libba Bray
She knew what it was to wait for someone who would never come home. She knew that grief, like a scar, faded but never really went away. -- Libba Bray
Felicity laughs and takes on the tone of a fashionable lady. Darling, the Bryn-Joneses have just done the most marvelous thing in their parlor with human blood. We simply must have ours done straightaway! -- Libba Bray
Sorry for all the pain and loneliness and disappointment. But there is this, too. -- Libba Bray
I'm sorry, Gemma. But we can't live in the light all of the time. You have to take whatever light you can hold into the dark with you. -- Libba Bray
I know. And I'm Sorry. People will disappoint you, Gemma. The question to ask is whether you can learn to live with the disappointment and move on. I'm offering you a new world. -- Libba Bray
Yes, after all, if I were to join you, I might enjoy myself, and wouldn't that be a shame? Please, don't spare me another thought. -- Libba Bray
Theta blew out another plume of cigarette smoke. Not interested. Love's messy, kiddo. Let those other girls get moony-eyed and goofy. Me? I got plans. -- Libba Bray
Evie didn't mind yelling, but she hated feeling judged. It got under her skin and made her feel small and ugly and unfixable. -- Libba Bray
Pippa's laugh is bitter, tinged with tears. 'Ha! Why do girls think being beautiful will solve every problem? Being beautiful just creates problems. It's a misery. I wish I were someone else. -- Libba Bray
Nobody Wants to be themselves. That's why there's tv. -Ephigenia, -- Libba Bray
I shan't ever understand your willingness to lie down and die," Felicity bars. "If you won't at least try to fight, I have no sympathy for you. -- Libba Bray
But if we are to remain a great empire, we must have a greater understanding of the hearts and minds of others. -- Libba Bray
That's some moon"
"Stop talking about my ass, you beast. -- Libba Bray
Next I know, I'll be calling myself the queen of Romania and wandering down the lane wearing my bed linens for a cape. -- Libba Bray
sometimes a little crazy is all you need -- Libba Bray
I've had so many bikini waxes, I cry every time I see a Popsicle stick. -- Libba Bray
Absence is a curious thing. When friends are absent they seem to loom ever larger, till the lack of them is all one can feel. -- Libba Bray
Everyone's dying. A little, every day. Make it count. -- Libba Bray
It wasn't my doing. It is the drink and the laudanum and the opium and that bloody refusal to live. That selfish grief. I thought I could change it with magic, but I can't. People will be who they are, and there is not enough magic in any world to change that. -- Libba Bray
War." Gorgon spits the word. "That is what they call it to give the illusion of honor and law. It is chaos. Madness and blood and the hunger to win. It has always been thus and shall always be so. -- Libba Bray
In every end, there is also a beginning. -- Libba Bray
History was haunted by the ghosts of buried crimes, which required periodic exorcisms of truth. Actions had consequences. Will -- Libba Bray
The wind has shifted to the East. A storm isn't far off. I can smell the moisture in the air, a fetid, living thing. Isolated drops fall, licking at my hands, my face, my dress. The quests squawk in surprise, turn their palms up to the sky as if questioning it, and dash for cover. -- Libba Bray
She bestowed the blessing of a wild girl's lips. -- Libba Bray
Naming my favorite books feels like naming a favorite child - impossible. -- Libba Bray
'Pastoralia' by George Saunders. Possibly my favorite book. It's one of the weirdest books I've ever read. If Monty Python and Thomas Pynchon had a love child, and it was raised by Frank Zappa on a weird commune, that would be this book. -- Libba Bray
I was a big reader as a kid, but it was 'Charlotte's Web' that showed me you could feel as if you were actually living inside a book. -- Libba Bray
There is an ancient tribal proverb I once heard in India. It says that before we can see properly we must first shed our tears to clear the way. -- Libba Bray
The line between faith and fanaticism is a constantly shifting one," Dr. Poblocki said. "When does belief become justification? When does right become rationale and crusade become crime? -- Libba Bray
Little clue: wasted on me." "What?" "I'm into girls." "Oh. Oh!" Chu said. "Right. Got it. That's cool. I've got a cousin who's gay. Amy Liu. Know her?" Jennifer laughed. "Oh, sure. I'll just look her up in the Big Book of Lesbians. We get a copy of that with the purchase of our first flannel shirt. -- Libba Bray
Nearby, Lady Liberty hoists her torch in the harbor, a beacon to all who come to these shores to escape persecution or famine or hopelessness. For this is the land of dreams. The -- Libba Bray
Feast for the Fisherman, the ultimate emo band. Said to be sold with a complimentary prescription for antidepressants and a free flatiron. -- Libba Bray
Any good world would allow for us to have free will, yes?" he continued. "Can we agree to this point? But once human beings have free will, they also have the ability to make choices - and commit evil. Thus, this very good thing, free will, allows the possibility of evil into our fine world. -- Libba Bray
You can never know about about your own destiny: are the people you meet there to play a part on your oun destiny, or do you exist just to play a role in theirs? -- Libba Bray
Because 'You're perfect just the way you are,' is what your guidance counselor says. And she's an alcoholic. -- Libba Bray
That's totally their interpreter," a girl with a lip ring informs us. "Even though they totally record their music in English, they totally speak in Inuktitut. Totally. -- Libba Bray
You are absolute angels of the first order. If I were Pope, I'd canonize you."
"The Pope would probably love to turn a cannon on you! -- Libba Bray
Memphis found his smile. 'You know me, sir. I don't wear worry. -- Libba Bray
I don't get jazz. It always sounds like a bunch of toddlers let loose in a music room. -- Libba Bray
You look very handsome, Papa," I say.
The twinkle is back in his eyes. "Smoke and mirrors," he says with a wink. "Smoke and mirrors. -- Libba Bray
One day, Evie O'Neill, you're gonna fall head over heels for me! -- Libba Bray
It's so daunting to walk into a classroom or a school auditorium. It's like the world's weirdest blind date. I know all the students are thinking, 'Who is this tool standing up in front of us?' -- Libba Bray
It seemed odd to Sosie that she had to make some hard-and-fast decision about such an arbitrary, individual thing as attraction, like having to declare an orientation major: I am straight with a minor in gay. -- Libba Bray
Duff's little moans traveled up her spine, made her head buzz. And another thought grabbed hold: She was doing this. She had the power to do this. THat she could be both completely vulnerable and totally in control was mind-blowing. -- Libba Bray
I'm a techno moron. I need help just to plug in my video camera. -- Libba Bray
- So my own sister will not promote me? Speaking of which, weren't you supposed to find me a beautiful future wife with a small fortune? Have you had any success on that front?
- Yes - I have warned them all. -- Libba Bray
They have money and position and Ann has none.It's amazing how often you can be right as long as you have those two things working in your favor. -- Libba Bray
I'm tired of everyone deciding what's for my own good! -- Libba Bray
I don't have time to feel sorry for myself. I've got to think. -- Libba Bray
I must remember to forgive myself. Because there's an awful lot of gray to work with. No one can live in the light all the time.-A Great and Terrible Beauty -- Libba Bray
Oh, sure. Of course, they say now that we've got Freud and the motorcar, God is dead."
"He's not dead; just very tired. -- Libba Bray
When you peeled back the skin, you were dealing with bone and muscle, blood and nerve endings. It was all the same. She liked the beautiful logic of the circulatory system, the elegance of the neurological, and the fierce warrior spirit of the heart. The body had rules and it had quirks. -- Libba Bray
And for a moment, I understand that I have friends on this lonely path; that sometimes your place is not something you find, but something you have when you need it. -- Libba Bray
Tell him I went to the lavatory," Evie said with a roll of her eyes. "Men are pos-i-tute-ly paralyzed by the mention of females in lavatories. -- Libba Bray
I am creating an atmosphere! Oh, Unc, we've finally got bodies in this joint! Paying bodies. We could have a good racket going here."
"I'm not interested in a 'racket.' I'm an academic."
"That's okay, Unc. I won't hold it against you. -- Libba Bray
I don't think you should die until you're ready. Until you've wrung out every last bit of living you can. -- Libba Bray
Agent Jones held Sinjin's face in his hands. "I'm going to make balloon animals. People need balloon animals."
"How right you are, strange delusional man," Sinjin said. -- Libba Bray
Taylor clapped three times for attention. "Ladies! Ladies! My stars! That's enough. Now. We all know Miss Arkansas's girls are fake, Miss Ohio's easier than making cereal, and Miss Montana's dress is something my blind meemaw would wear to bingo night."
- "Beauty Queens -- Libba Bray
She shrieks above the din. If you wish a battle, I shall give it. I am the last of my kind. I shall not lie down without a fight. -- Libba Bray
I do not want to pass the time. I want to grab hold of it and leave my mark upon the world. -- Libba Bray
Everything is randomly connected. -- Libba Bray
I had a friend who said, "You don't have an internal critic. You have an internal sadist." -- Libba Bray
I love myself. They make it so hard for us to love ourselves. -- Libba Bray
I thought research would be more glamorous, somehow. I'd give the librarian a secret code word and he'd give me the one book I needed and whisper the necessary page numbers. Like a speakeasy. With books. -- Libba Bray
Do you think they missed him terribly when he fell? Did God cry over his lost angel, I wonder? -- Libba Bray
Who but the mad would choose to keep on living? In the end, aren't we all just a little crazy? -- Libba Bray
It's so laughable that it's somewhere beyond comedy and right into tragedy again. -- Libba Bray
You are truly Satan's sequined spawn. -- Libba Bray
As a journalist, I am compelled to know the answers."
"As a girl, I am compelled to protect what's left of my manicure," Petra said. -- Libba Bray
There is nothing more terrifying than the absoluteness of one who believes he's right. -- Libba Bray
Board the cows! We've come to enslave your marigolds. -- Libba Bray
Murder was just another reason to drink -- Libba Bray
Idealism is just an escape from reality. There is no utopia. -- Libba Bray
Why was his grief more powerful than his love? Why couldn't he find it within himself to fight back?
Why am I not enough to live for? -- Libba Bray
I'm one of those people who has to write. If I don't write, I feel itchy and depressed and cranky. So everybody's glad when I write and stop complaining already. -- Libba Bray
He took comfort in the neon signs, the wild strands of jazz creeping out of clubs whenever happy swells of people pushed through the doors in their finery. -- Libba Bray
Evie narrowed her eyes. "A time limit. Four weeks of the swooniest, swellest romance New York City has ever seen. And then, kaput. Over and out. Off the air."
"Golly, when you say it like that, it sounds as if our love's not real, Lamb Chop. -- Libba Bray
How now Mad Cow? -- Libba Bray
It was not a curse to fully inhabit your body. -- Libba Bray
Sheep. I'm stuck in a boarding school filled with sheep. -- Libba Bray
You can't believe how bleeding scary the sea is! There's, like, whales and storms and shit! They don't bloody tell you that! -- Libba Bray
I told myself it was the snow - she couldn't possibly get to Philadelphia on the roads. I told myself a hundred lies. Children do that. It's amazing the sorts of things you'll make yourself believe. -- Libba Bray
For dreams, too, are ghosts, desires chased in sleep, gone by morning. -- Libba Bray
Sam had a skill that often let him take what he needed. But you couldn't do that with love. It had to be given. Shared. -- Libba Bray
On TV, talking heads wrung their hands over a lack of traditional feminine values and wondered if girls' sports were to blame. Then they cut to a commercial featuring a sexy college coed vacuuming her dorm room in her underwear. -- Libba Bray
And now if you'll excuse me, I should like to finish my book, alone, without the presence of a single ringleted girl to disrupt me. If you should come for me at dinner and find me in my chair, gone to the angels at last, you shall know that I died alone, which is to say in a state of utter bliss. -- Libba Bray
I hate this place," Tiara whimpered. "It's super creepy. Like a haunted Chuck E. Cheese's where the games all want to kill you and you never get your pizza. -- Libba Bray
Live life as if today is your last day living. -- Libba Bray
It's over, her mind whispered. There's still hope, her heart insisted. -- Libba Bray
The man in the shop peered disapprovingly at Evie through the glass. She pumped her arms and legs up and down in imitation of a marching band, gave the man a salute, and continued her meandering walk to the museum. -- Libba Bray
What happened to the winner" Adina asked.
"She tripped."
"And the first runner-up?"
Miss Michigan cracked her knuckles. "She tripped, too. -- Libba Bray
People think boundaries and borders build nations. Nonsense-words do. Beliefs, declarations, constitutions-words. Stories. Myths. Lies. Promises. History -- Libba Bray
Oh shit! Can you say 'fuck' in a graveyard or will it jinx you with the undead? -- Libba Bray
Careful there, Poet. I might start to believe you. -- Libba Bray
My cholera's acting up again. -- Libba Bray
Theta crashed next to them on the thick zebra-skin rug. "I'm embalmed."
"Potted and splificated?"
"Ossified to the gills. Time for night-night. -- Libba Bray
I've never done acid, finding it hard to go willingly to a place that could be frightening, hellish, and totally beyond my control. A place much like high school. -- Libba Bray
There had been something about the island that made the girls forget who they had been. All those rules and shalt nots. They were no longer waiting for some arbitrary grade. They were no longer performing. Waiting. Hoping. They were becoming. They were. -- Libba Bray
Sometimes Felicity is as much a mystery to me as the location of the Temple. She is spiteful and childish one minute, lively and spirited in the next; a girl kind enough to bring Ann home for Christmas and small enough to think Kartik her inferior. -- Libba Bray
I know because I read ... Your mind is not a cage. It's a garden. And it requires cultivating. -- Libba Bray
No person has ever held all the power. There must be a balance between chaos and order, dark and light. With the Temple magic bound to you, the realms are no longer in balance. The power could change you ... and you could change the magic. -- Libba Bray
Are you saying we're not ravish-worthy? -- Libba Bray
Warning: If you are insufferable, do not walk here. We shall eat you down to the marrow. -- Libba Bray
The gasps catch from girl to girl like a brush fire. -- Libba Bray
I refuse to let the past find me here. -- Libba Bray
New Maxi-Pad Pets. Accessories for your period.
Brought to you by The Corporation: In your homes and
in your pants. -- Libba Bray
Clothing left on the bed unfolded. Books stained with coffee spots. Tabs not paid until the last possible second. Boys kissed and then forgotten in a week's time. -- Libba Bray
She holds up a finger. I'm getting to it. Don't rush a girl in the middle of her exposition. -- Libba Bray
The dull pain of truth weights my soul, pulling it under. I am left hopelessly awake. -- Libba Bray
Scoring well on tests is the sort of happy thing that gets the school district the greenbacks they crave. Understanding and appreciating the material are secondary. -- Libba Bray
One can never go back. One always has to move forward. -- Libba Bray
Can we really conquer chaos so easily? If that were so, I should be able to prune the pandemonium of my own soul into something neat and tidy rather than this maze of wants and needs and misgivings that has me forever feeling as if I cannot fit into the landscape of things. -- Libba Bray
It's just too bad they have to die. They're totally bangable, you know?" "Bangable," Taylor mouthed in disgust. She wanted to show this boy another meaning for the word bang, and it involved his head against a steel door. -- Libba Bray
Felicity and I watch the dancers moving as one. They spin about like the earth on it's axis, enduring the dark, waiting for the sun. -- Libba Bray
I'm just saying it's not all sand castles and ninjas. -- Libba Bray
You've been assigned an identity since birth. Then you spend the rest of your life walking around in it to see if it really fits. You try on all these different selves and abandon just as many. But really it's about dismantling all that false armor, getting down to what's real. -- Libba Bray
I'm an oddity of one, my strangeness too complicated to explain or share. -- Libba Bray
The police have asked for my help. There's been a murder."
"A murder! Oh, my. Let me just change my shoes," Evie said excitedly. "It won't be a minute. -- Libba Bray
This is going to make such a great story: How I nursed a pirate back to health and my love saved him," Miss Ohio said with a contented sigh. "And then we can have our own reality show about our relationship."
- "Beauty Queens -- Libba Bray
I can be whatever. You can be whatever. We can be whatever. Whatever, together. -- Libba Bray
How I'd love to get away from here and be someone else for a while in a place where no one knows or expects certain things from me. -- Libba Bray
What
you don't believe in true love?" Petra asked. "The kind that can then be parlayed into awesome merchandising opportunities?"
- "Beauty Queens -- Libba Bray
You know that moment in 'The Matrix' when Neo takes the red pill and is plunged into the real world? That's what it felt like when I first read 'Watchmen' - like someone was taking a can opener to my head to make room for Moore's audacious brilliance. -- Libba Bray
You're quite tall.' Just what a girl wants to be reminded of. -- Libba Bray
He's jealous! Kartik is jealous and Simon finds me ... delicious? I am a bit giddy. And confused. But no, mostly giddy, I find. -- Libba Bray
I'm coming with you," Kartik insists. "You'll get yourself killed," I argue. "Then it's a good day to die," he says, -- Libba Bray
Meraa mitra yahaan aaiye," he murmurs. I understand only a little Hindi, enough to know what he has said: Come here, my friend.
I've never known a braver girl," he says. -- Libba Bray
When I dream, I dream of him. -- Libba Bray
Thou shalt not steal. I seem to recall that being one of God's I'd rather you didn't lest I have to smite you into ash commandments. -- Libba Bray
Why is it that some secrets can drown you while some pull you close to others in a way you never want to lose? -- Libba Bray
I salute your spunk, but I question your sanity, Sam said. -- Libba Bray
He's attracted to the smell of manure," Felicity says. "You might wallow in the stables to bring out the full flower of his love. -- Libba Bray
Reminds us that greatness lies even in the smallest of moments, in the humblest of hearts, and we shall, each of us, be called to greatness. Whether we shall rise to meet it or let it slip away is the challenge put before us all. -- Libba Bray
I'm sorry,' he says simply. 'People make mistakes, Gemma. We take the wrong action for the right reasons, and the right action for the wrong reasons. -- Libba Bray
They misspelled 'party.' How evil genius can they be? -- Libba Bray
I run after her, not really giving chase. I'm running because I can, because I must.
Because I want to see how far I can go before I have to stop. -- Libba Bray
Perhaps it is only the light. Perhaps it is the power of the realms at work through me. Or perhaps it is some combination of spirit and desire, love and hope, some alchemy that we each possess and can put to use, if first we know were to look without flinching. -- Libba Bray
Or perhaps it is some combination of spirit and desire, love and hope, some alchemy that we each possess and can put to use, if we first know where to look without flinching. -- Libba Bray
Sometimes I just want to burn down all the rules and start over. -- Libba Bray
That's what living in their world is-a big lie. An illusion where everyone looks the other way and pretends that nothing unpleasant exists at all, no goblins of the dark, no ghosts of the soul. -- Libba Bray
Wow, you're awesome and The universe loves a winner, so the universe must really love you! -- Libba Bray
I change the world, the world changes me. -- Libba Bray
There is a dualism inherent in democracy
opposing forces pushing against each other, always. Culture clashes. Different belief systems. All coming together to create this country. But this balance takes a great deal of energy. -- Libba Bray
I don't want to have this conversation. It's sunny out. There's bacon downstairs. -- Libba Bray
Women who have power are always feared. -- Libba Bray
The mere suggestion of fame and fortune casts a glamour all its own. It is rather alarming how quickly people will turn someone else's fiction into fact in order to support their own fictions of themselves. -- Libba Bray
Really? And what curse befalls the Adams of the world?"
Ann opens her mouth and, presumably thinking of nothing to say, closes it again.
It is Felicity who answers, eyes steely. "They are weak to temptation. And we are their temptresses. -- Libba Bray
She wished she were as inconsequential as the ghosts in her dreams. -- Libba Bray
There's no such thing as nothing. In every nothing, there's a something. In fact, there could be everything! -- Libba Bray
Hot off the presses, today's headlines: The love of your life does not approve of my wanton flapper ways," Evie said in a voice of affected mystery. "Really, Mabesie. You might want to reconsider - he is a bit of a killjoy. -- Libba Bray
There were few things worse than being ordinary, in Evie's opinion. Ordinary was for suckers. -- Libba Bray
With each shimmy, the bugle beads on their scandalously revealing costumes swung and shook. It was the sort of display Evie knew her mother would have found appalling - an example of the moral decay of the young generation. It was sexual and dangerous and thrilling, and Evie wanted more of it. -- Libba Bray
For once, Evie didn't know what to say. She hadn't really thought of her uncle as very human. He was more like a textbook who occasionally remembered to put on a tie. But it was clear that he was, indeed, human, with a deep wound named Rotke. -- Libba Bray
Next time we see you, you'll be on trial for some ingenious crime!" Dottie said with a laugh. Evie grinned. "Just as long as they know my name. -- Libba Bray
Judge not, lest ye be judged. -- Libba Bray
A token of bathroom stoner etiquette. -- Libba Bray
If there's anything I'm starting to learn about people it's (a) that they are fundamentally suspicious and afraid of anyone who is "different," and (b) that fear makes them do and say asinine things. -- Libba Bray
I want to ask him if it's possible that a girl can be born unlovable, or does she just become that way? -- Libba Bray
Memphis - it's just a bird. Birds fly around, brother. It's what they do. It's not following you, and it's not a sign. Unless you really did give it candy and flowers, in which case you are one strange brother. -- Libba Bray
In books, the truth makes everything good and fine. The good prevail. The wicked are punished. There is happiness. But it's not like that really, is it?"
"No," I say. "I suppose it only makes everything known. -- Libba Bray
They talked, too, of their futures, as if they could shape the glittering course of their destinies with secret confessions offered like prayers to the room's benevolent hush. -- Libba Bray
I am no longer content to be the scared, obedient schoolgirl. Who are you, a stranger, to tell me what I can and cannot do? -- Libba Bray
Mawah meenon ne le plus poohlala, I say with an affected bow. -- Libba Bray
There are times when one friend requires the blind faith of another ... -- Libba Bray
Promise. Don't misunderstand me - you are quite vexing." He touches his tender jaw. "And you hit like a man. But you didn't cause his illness. That is his doing. -- Libba Bray
When she can't bring me to heal with scolding, she bends me to shape with guilt. -- Libba Bray
Might. Is there any opiate more powerful than that word? -- Libba Bray
Goodbye, I whisper at last, when it no longer matters and there is no one to hear it but the window. -- Libba Bray
We have traveled through space and time. We have been many places. Visited many worlds. And there is good news: the acoustics everywhere are terrific. -- Libba Bray
They see her differently now, as somebody. And isn't that what everyone wants? To be seen? -- Libba Bray
And now I understand that truth casts a spell of its own, one I'm not sure of how to hold on to, though I'm desperate to try. -- Libba Bray
Amen, sister, ... All apologies to Tom Cruise. -- Libba Bray
I know because I read. -- Libba Bray
She is the elephant's eyebrows, -- Libba Bray
Maybe girls need an island to find themselves. Maybe they need a place where no one's is watching them so they can be who they really are -- Libba Bray
I wonder how many times each day she dies a little. -- Libba Bray
You don't notice the light without a bit of shadow. -- Libba Bray
Men have feelings too, you know. You bruise the petals of my manflower. -- Libba Bray
How terrible it is to have no cares, no longings. I do not fit. I feel too deeply and want too much. As cages go, it is a gilded one, but I shall not live well in it or any cage for that matter. -- Libba Bray
The world is a lie...not you and me. -- Libba Bray
Could you look again, please?" the woman asked in a clipped, slightly British accent. "It was sent parcel post two weeks ago from Miss Felicity Worthington and addressed to Mrs. Rao, Mrs. Gemma Doyle Rao. -- Libba Bray
You have a steady fella?" Sam asked after a bit.
"No fella can hold me for long."
Sam gave her a sideways glance. "That a challenge?"
"No. A statement of fact. -- Libba Bray
There's a lot of foot stomping, clapping, and cheering. I just want to win some cash and find my yard gnome. It's not a lot to ask. -- Libba Bray
It is funny how you do not miss affection until it is given, but once it is, it can never be enough; you would drown in it if possible. -- Libba Bray
Tonight, she went into the woods, and I fear she shall live in the woods of my soul for the rest of my days. -- Libba Bray
Why does it always seem that I have only the shadow of my father? I'm like a child constantly grabbing at his coattails and missing. -- Libba Bray
Well, are you going to motivate people to bring peace to war-torn nations, or are you going to motivate people to join a cult and drink the Kool-Aid? -- Libba Bray
Because you don't notice the light without a bit of shadow. Everything has both dark and light. You have to play with it till you get it exactly right. -- Libba Bray
Writers are also sort of like vultures, but with fewer ethics. -- Libba Bray
Your mother and I do not approve of drinking. Have you not heard of the Eighteenth Amendment?"
"Prohibition? I drink to its health whenever I can. -- Libba Bray
We sit and listen and are enthralled anew, for good stories, it seems, never lose their magic. -- Libba Bray
Hold up. How do you accidentally have sex with somebody?" Adina scoffed. "Is she all, 'Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't see your penis there'? -- Libba Bray
Eve didn't choose to eat the apple. She was tempted by the serpent."
"Yes," I argue, thoughts coming out half-formed. "But ... she didn't have to take a bite. She chose to. -- Libba Bray
Often, the monsters we create in our imagination are not nearly as frightening as the monstrous acts perpetrated by ordinary human beings in the aim of one cause or another. -- Libba Bray
How do you invent a religion?" Evie asked.
Will looked over the top of his spectacles. "You say, 'God told me the following,' and then wait for people to sign up. -- Libba Bray
We've got about as much chance of communing with the dead as we do of sitting in Parliament. -- Libba Bray
He said to tell you to remember your heart in all things, that it is where your honor and your destiny will be found. Does it mean anything to you?'
It is something he would say from time to time-that the eye could be misled, but that the heart was true. -- Libba Bray
I am hard at work on the second draft ... Second draft is really a misnomer as there are a gazillion revisions, large and small, that go into the writing of a book. -- Libba Bray
Tell my brother to remember his heart in all things. That is where his honor and his destiny will be found. Tell him. -- Libba Bray
I am a jumble of passions, misgivings, and wants. It seems that I am always in a state of wishing and rarely in a state of contentment. -- Libba Bray
People have a habit of inventing fictions they will believe wholeheartedly in order to ignore the truth they cannot accept. -- Libba Bray
People always fear what they don't understand, Evangeline. History proves that. -- Libba Bray
Books are, at their heart, dangerous. Yes, dangerous. Because they challenge us: our prejudices, our blind spots. They open us to new ideas, new ways of seeing. They make us hurt in all the right ways. They can push down the barricades of 'them' & widen the circle of 'us. -- Libba Bray
I don't trust her father than I can run full-steam in a corset. -- Libba Bray
In a manner befitting your station while at Spence. It's fine to be kind to the lesser girls, but remember that they are not your equals. Station. Lesser girls. Not your equals. It's a laugh, really. -- Libba Bray
Reason was for suckers and Presbyterians. -- Libba Bray
Very well, Your Ladyship Brooding St. Petulant, -- Libba Bray
There's a moment of profound sadness that can be dispelled only by summoning my anger. -- Libba Bray
I am dying a thousand cruel and unusual deaths as fifty pairs of eyes take me in, size me up like something that should be hanging over a fireplace in a gentleman's den. -- Libba Bray
But we can't go back. We can only go forward. -- Libba Bray
We've the right to dream, and that, I suppose, is the magic's greatest power: the notion that we can pick possibility from the trees like ripe fruit. -- Libba Bray
Prepared to fly, even if she has to loose her legs to do it -- Libba Bray
Jeez, someone needs to push the reset button on this planet. -- Libba Bray
People can live with only so much honesty. And sometimes, people can surprise you. -- Libba Bray
I know the English are terribly sentimental about the sea, but I can live without it. -- Libba Bray
I know because I read. Might I suggest you try it? -- Libba Bray
My misery is reaching epidemic proportions. -- Libba Bray
If you tell them what they want to hear, they don't bother to try to see. -- Libba Bray
What if I choose the dream instead? -- Libba Bray
It's always darkest before the ultimate sparkle. -- Libba Bray
The ground's soft with pine needles and the occasional crunch of a cone. The air smells like it's just been born. -- Libba Bray
Lord, cat. Announce yourself next time. I don't have no nine lives. -- Libba Bray
I took Advanced PowerPoint last semester. You guys are always misunderestimating me. I'm totally ready to handle the big stuff. -- Libba Bray
Retaliation is a dog chasing its tail -- Libba Bray
When you looked up to the sky and cried 'Why?' sometimes the sky shrugged, yet other times it answered with warm assurance of linked hands. -- Libba Bray
Evie replied with an eye-roll. "Do you think you can manage to not steal anything while I'm gone?"
"The only thing I'm trying to steal is your heart, doll." Sam smirked.
"You're not that talented a thief, Sam Lloyd. -- Libba Bray
Everyone seems to want more form me. I am a thoroughly disappointing girl around. I shall wear a scarlet 'D' upon my bosom for all to see so that they will know not to raise their expectations. -- Libba Bray
What is the French word for rain? Le rain? La rain? Is the rain masculine or feminine? It's such a bother that it must be masculine. -- Libba Bray
Nicole hated that she could never quite feel like she was just herself, just Nicole, but that she was somehow representing an entire race. That's how they saw her, as a "they" and not a "she. -- Libba Bray
This is how it is now. There is strength in acceptance, Ling. Your legs have been taken from you. But how you choose to live with that has not. -- Libba Bray
I will tell you the story of how we found ourselves in a realm where dreams are formed, destiny is chosen, and magic is as real as a handprint in the snow. -- Libba Bray
As one, they leap, laughing, and that is where we leave them - mouths open, arms spread wide, fingers splayed to take in the whole world, bodies flying high in defiance of gravity, as if they will never fall. -- Libba Bray
I've heard it said that God is in the details. It's the same with the truth. Leave out the details, the crucial heart, and you can damn someone with the bare bones of it. -- Libba Bray
You want to know what pain is? Try running out of Advil when you've got a Category Five period. I've had cramps that would make grown men beg for a bullet between the eyes."
- Jennifer, "Beauty Queens -- Libba Bray
You can never really know someone completely. That's why it's the most terrifying thing in the world, really - taking someone on faith, hoping they'll take you on faith too. It's such a precarious balance, It's a wonder we do it at all. And yet.. -- Libba Bray
Will was making a speech, something about having been young and careless once, the sort of thing old-timers said when they issued a deathblow, as if they thought their sanctimonious ramblings disguised as empathy would be welcomed, but Evie was only half listening. -- Libba Bray
She wears her grief like a coat of feathers too heavy for flight. -- Libba Bray
It is a giggle full of high spirits and merry mischief, proof that we never lose our girlish selves, no matter what sort of women we become. -- Libba Bray
I have never felt more ridiculous. If this is what it means to be a woman I am not the slightest bit interested. -- Libba Bray
They kept the lie going, and the people loved it. -- Libba Bray
A place to keep all your secrets -- Libba Bray
Usually, I avoid the topic by shoving food into my mouth then making "I'm sorry, as you can see, it would be rude for me to speak" hand signals -- Libba Bray
What's the difference between an undead and my last boyfriend? One is a soul-sucking beast from hell and the other is an undead. -- Libba Bray
Did God ever cry over his lost angel, I wonder? -- Libba Bray
It was funny how one afternoon with a best friend could set a girl right. -- Libba Bray
We're like pretty horses, and just as on horses, they mean to put blinders on us so we can't look left or right but only straight ahead where they would lead. -- Libba Bray
I love you for who you are, not who the world thinks you should be. -- Libba Bray
Even Felicity can't keep from sputtering with laughter. I wish I could use my evil eye. Or at least my evil boot right smack against Cecily's backside. -- Libba Bray
And sometimes I just don't want to sparkle. -- Libba Bray
Did you hear? You are free.
Yessss. Choice. It is a fine thing. And I choose to take you back, Most High. -- Libba Bray
I changed the world; the world changed me.
Everything you do comes back to you. When you affect a situation, you are also affected. -- Libba Bray
Evie's eyes widened. More interesting than dope and sorcery? -- Libba Bray
He's got a laugh like a machine gun firing through velvet. -- Libba Bray
I am a lot of things, not all of them noble. -- Libba Bray
Miss Teen Dreamers. It is time to get ahold of ourselves. Miss Alabama, I did not mean that literally. That is gross. Stop it. Taylor -- Libba Bray
This is the world we live in, Gemma, for better or for worse. Make of it what you can, he says, and I pull him to me. -- Libba Bray
She hadn't meant to get trapped in a conversation. That was the trouble with offering help to old people. -- Libba Bray
The hand you hold the longest is your own. -- Libba Bray
You've influenced the world not because you wanted to hug it and cuddle it and call it sweet thing, but because one day you wanted to beat the crap out of somebody but you didn't. You made a painting instead. -- Libba Bray
Why does anyone do anything? Belief. A belief that they are doing right and just in their actions. -- Libba Bray
With a low bow, she is gone in a haze of roses and hope -- Libba Bray
To those who will see, the world waits. -- Libba Bray
And when it comes, her kiss is like something not so much felt as found. -- Libba Bray
Don't you? if you keep them from the magic, they will never know what their lives could be.'
They will remain protected,' Asha insists.
No, 'I say. 'Only untested. -- Libba Bray
But without that spark of anger, without destruction, there can be no rebirth. -- Libba Bray
In them, she saw the sham of her life laid out like a book, the foolish belief that she, that anyone, could escape the consequences of this world, could flee from death. That was the deceit. The true serpent in the garden. -- Libba Bray
Just once, she'd like to be the exciting one, the girl somebody wanted. -- Libba Bray
Sometimes we seek that which we are not yet ready to find. -- Libba Bray
Without further warning, the sky opens up and cries. -- Libba Bray
Peace is not happenstance. It is a living fire that must be fed constantly. It must be tended to with vigilance, else it dies out. -- Libba Bray
Really, being a librarian is a much more dangerous job than you realize. -- Libba Bray
Quick answers often lead to quick regrets. -- Libba Bray
In truth, it is the simplest act in the world. The trick works because you wish it to. You must remember the most important rule of and successful illusion; First the people must want to believe it. -- Libba Bray
It occurs to me that cricket is not the true sport in London - gossip is. -- Libba Bray
You are unique, and this is a beautiful, beautiful thing, grasshopper. -- Libba Bray
And that is how change happens. One gesture. One person. One moment at a time. -- Libba Bray
To live is to love, to love is to live. -- Libba Bray
You must remember, my dear lady, the most important rule of any successful illusion: First, the people must want to believe in it. -- Libba Bray
I grew up doing theatre and spent a long time as a playwright. I still think very visually when I write. -- Libba Bray
Every mornin', every evenin', ain't we got fun? -- Libba Bray
If you would understand the present, you must come to know the past. -- Libba Bray
Sometimes I see things, I think. Out of the corner of my eye, taunting me, and then it's gone. And dreams. Such horrible dreams. What if something terrible happened to me? What if I am damaged?"
The rain is a cool kiss on my sleeve as I link my arm with hers. "We're all damaged somehow. -- Libba Bray
I'm whining. It's unattractive, but I find I'm powerless to stop -- Libba Bray
I'm like everyone else in this stupid, bloody, amazing world. I'm flawed. Impossibly so. But hopeful. I'm still me. -- Libba Bray
Because the pure girls get rescued."
Mary Lou felt something she didn't let herself feel often. She was well and truly pissed off. "Why do girls have to be all pure and innocent and good? Why don't guys have to be? -- Libba Bray
i salute your spunk, but question your sanity. -- Libba Bray
He frowns. A dance with the carnivorous Felicity? Why? Has she eaten all the other available gentlemen? -- Libba Bray
We've barley stepped into the bright glow of the realms when everything goes dark ... -- Libba Bray
Can we talk about the miracle that is the Small World ride? It's like an acid trip drag show. -- Libba Bray
Because there's nothing wrong with you ... that can't be fixed. -- Libba Bray
We all do things we desperately wish we could undo. Those regrets just become part of who we are, along with everything else. To spend time trying to change that, well, it's like chasing clouds. -- Libba Bray
The key holds the truth -- Libba Bray
There's an -or- in -whore- because you always have a choice to respect your body and say no. -- Libba Bray
This is how the fire starts. This is how we burn. -- Libba Bray
Dammit!" "What?" Gonzo sounds panicked. "We're out of gas." "You're Shithenging me." "I Shithenge you not. -- Libba Bray
Look, I know this seems a little half-assed ... ' 'No, dude. I'd be thrilled if this plan were half-assed. This is, like, no-assed.' 'You're right. It's the most no-assed thing I've ever done in my life. -- Libba Bray
I'm a librarian, not an oracle. -- Libba Bray
My mom's al like sparkle sparkle sparkle and I'm all like sparkle yourself -- Libba Bray
Because you can't keep up the illusion forever," I say. "No one has that much magic. -- Libba Bray
Things aren't good or bad in and of themselves. It's what we do with them that makes them so. -- Libba Bray
I hate high heels. Walking in high heels for eight hours a day should be forbidden by the Geneva Convention. -- Libba Bray
If there was one truth Evie had learned in her short life, it was that forgiveness was easier to seek than permission. She didn't plan to ask for either one. -- Libba Bray
I change the world and the world changes me -- Libba Bray
So, now I've been to see a drug counselor who told me I need to lay off the drugs and talk about my feelings, and a shrink who heard what I had to say and immediately put me on drugs. -- Libba Bray
We are made by what we are asked to bear, Ling Chan," he'd said. -- Libba Bray
How can my ankles and arms be obscene? -- Libba Bray
He took her face into his hands and his kiss blotted out the sky -- Libba Bray
I don't know how to accomplish such a look. I find myself with a new fear: that I shall never, ever be this lovely. -- Libba Bray
He wanted to hit something or someone. He wanted to burn up the whole world, heal it, and burn it down again. -- Libba Bray
I'd like to thank readers. Every time you open a book, it is a strike against ignorance. Unless you're reading Sarah Palin. -- Libba Bray
I'm related to Davy Crockett on my mom's side. Honest. -- Libba Bray
But the past cannot be changed, and we carry our choices with us, forward, into the unknown. We can only move on. -- Libba Bray
It's as if I've inherited a skin I cannot quite fit, and so I walk about constantly pulling and and tugging, pinning and pruning, trying desperately to fill it out, hoping that no one will look at me struggling and say, 'That one there- she's a fraud, Look how she doesn't fit at all. -- Libba Bray
You try standing up to my mom. She's a force of nature. -- Libba Bray
It isn't that we do what we want. It's that we're allowed to want at all. -- Libba Bray
There's a lot about discovering who you are and how difficult that is. And it never stops. -- Libba Bray
But you've changed,' I whisper. 'Haven't you?'
It is the scorpian's nature to sting. Just because he has no opportunity doesn't mean that he cannot. -- Libba Bray
My stomach aches a new. blasted inconvenience. What do young men have to mark their entry into adulthood? Trousers, that's what. Fine, new trousers. I despise absolutely everyone just now. -- Libba Bray
So. Tell me," Marlowe tried gamely, "what do you think is man's greatest invention?"
Jericho turned his head just slightly toward Marlowe, looking him straight in the eye. "God. -- Libba Bray
We are English, and I expect you to behave as such. No more crying. -- Libba Bray
Power changes everything till it is difficult to say who are the heroes and who the villains. -- Libba Bray
It was hard to feel safe in the world when you were a girl. -- Libba Bray
Evie was so nervous that she downed her cocktail in two stiff swigs, then refilled her glass.
Henry arched an eyebrow. "A pro, I see."
"What else is there to do in Ohio? -- Libba Bray
I think about dying every day, because I can't stop thinking about living. -- Libba Bray
Please do not strain yourself, Miss Doyle. I won't have my girls going cross-eyed in the name of art. -- Libba Bray
In a world like this one, only the random makes sense. -- Libba Bray
What do you feel? I've never been asked this question once. None of us has. We aren't supposed to feel. We're British. -- Libba Bray
But what was the point of living so quietly you made no noise at all? -- Libba Bray
Dreams were dreams and reality was reality and she felt people were better off understanding the difference. -- Libba Bray
No one can steal our dream. -- Libba Bray
We're comfortable with women in certain roles but not comfortable with women expressing anger or fully accepting their power. The most daring question a woman can ask is, 'What do I want?' -- Libba Bray
Any librarian or scholar will tell you: Close is not the same as accurate. -- Libba Bray
The desperation meeting the silence with its unmasked wish. -- Libba Bray
Free the snow globes! -- Libba Bray
Sam's mother used to say that inside everyone was the chance to change the world. It sat like a seed eager to grow into greatness. The professor could have his ghosts. Ordinary people were capable of extraordinary bravery. That was the only magic Sam knew or trusted. -- Libba Bray
What fresh hell is this?" Adina muttered. -- Libba Bray
Sitting in my favorite coffeehouse with a new notebook and a hot cup of java is my idea of Heaven. -- Libba Bray
I invited myself. Thought this table needed some class. -- Libba Bray
My family traditions are alcoholism and dysfunction," Jennifer said. "Oh, and anything you can make from government cheese. -- Libba Bray
But sons are a different matter to a man. More a duty than an indulgence. -- Libba Bray
I know I've done the right thing but I couldn't feel worse about it, and I suppose that is part of what it is to lead. -- Libba Bray
Instead, I try to adjust to the dawn, letting the tears fall where they may, because it is morning; it is morning and there is so much to see. -- Libba Bray
Truth casts a spell of its own. -- Libba Bray
It's possible to pretend I'm someone other than who I am, and if I pretend long enough, I can believe it. -- Libba Bray
All things are possible. -- Libba Bray
What you want can be yours. But you must first know what it is you want. -- Libba Bray
Why must we die when everything within us was born to live? -- Libba Bray
Whatever is without question is most vulnerable. -- Libba Bray
The trouble with morning is that it comes well before noon. -- Libba Bray
Only ninnies go to Penny's. -- Libba Bray
These words have been sanitized for your protection. An adjective and a noun, respectively. -- Libba Bray
Come on, Father. Stop me. Tell me to behave, to go to hell, something, anything. -- Libba Bray
He plants his feet stubbornly, adopting what he must think is an heroic post. He's just begging for a pigeon to fly by and relieve itself. -- Libba Bray
The photographer had caught her midlaugh, and the defiance of her bared teeth and wide lips gave her face a hint of mischief and forthrightness. The girl in this photograph bet the house. -- Libba Bray
Think: who has vans, huh? Soccer moms and serial killers. -- Libba Bray
Jericho didn't seem to know life beyond the pages of a musty old book, and he didn't seem interested in knowing anything beyond that, either. -- Libba Bray
Life don't come to you, Memphis. You gotta take it. We have to take it. Because ain't nobody handing it to us. -- Libba Bray
Write like it matters, and it will. -- Libba Bray
We create the illusions we need to go on. -- Libba Bray
I wish to live for myself. I should never want to be trapped. -- Libba Bray
People see what they want to see when they need to. -- Libba Bray
