"Mrs. Snow had lived forty years, and for fifteen of those years she had been too busy wishing things were different to find much time to enjoy things as they were."

"It's funny how dogs and cats know the insides of folks better than other folks do, isn't it?"

"What men and women need is encouragement. Their natural resisting powers should be strengthened, not weakened.... Instead of always harping on a man's faults, tell him of his virtues. Try to pull him out of his rut of bad habits. Hold up to him his better self, his REAL self that can dare and do and win out!... The influence of a beautiful, helpful, hopeful character is contagious, and may revolutionize a whole town.... People radiate what is in their minds and in their hearts. If a man feels kindly and obliging, his neighbors will feel that way, too, before long. But if he scolds and scowls and criticizes — his neighbors will return scowl for scowl, and add interest!... When you look for the bad, expecting it, you will get it. When you know you will find the good — you will get that.... Tell your son Tom you KNOW he'll be glad to fill that woodbox — then watch him start, alert and interested!"

"...this great grey pile of stone has been a house, never a home. It takes a woman's hand and heart, or a child's presence to make a home..."

"Sometimes, if you stand very still in the shadows of those places, you can hear songs on the wind, whispers in the trees. That is why I travel."

"Just when you think that life is slowing down, magic happens. The universe sends you a message, like a tsvit paporot on your doorstep. The question is: what do you wish for?"

"I would add to my mother’s wisdom that the key to love is in the breath. You know you love a man when you can stand his breath in the morning after a night of drinking and cigarettes. When you can kiss him after he finishes a garlic and butter sandwich and still enjoy the feel of his lips. When he looks into your eyes, tells you he loves you—and the pickled herring and onions are stronger than his voice—yet you still smile. You still want to be close to him. Yes, then you have found love. My Baba used to say that the breath is a taste of the spirit. When two spirits recognize each other in memory and future, then love grows."

"By dancing we could remain in the moment. By dancing we could avoid talking, dwelling on the past, or thinking about the future. We were connected in a way that was neither threatening nor complicated; just circling and swaying, following the oldest rhythms of breath and heartbeat."

"Back home, these lessons were taught in songs and stories passed along by grandmothers, wise women who held a cherished place in the circle of community. I thought someday to take my place among them. But the war had broken the cycle and torn millions of people away from the bosoms of their mothers. We were forever searching to recapture all that we had lost … connections to blood, to bones, to earth. And connections resurface … refuse to be denied."

"Follow me on a journey into heaven and hell, past angels and devils, into the realm of dreams. That is where our souls go when we sleep, to meet up with our soul mate, to love without abandon, without regret. For in the morning we must return to life and all its painful illusions."

"If only the wind could reach inside me, wipe clean my heartache, my guilt, my confusion. If only the waves could wash away this heartache, this jealousy and rage, this guilt and sadness. If only the rocks could lend me their stability, their strength, so I might choose wisely. If only the sun could burn away my past, so I would not have to live with any regrets."

"There’s not such thing as magic that does no harm."

"A restaurant is an unusual business, charged as it is with stewardship of one of the fundamental processes of our animal biology. Until breathing and excretion can be commodified, the restaurant manager inhabits a rarified sphere whose only other residents are obstetricians, undertakers, and whores."

"(IL: Did you love Jemisin's Hugo speech directed at the rabid/sad puppies or what?) NH: Nora is graceful forthrightness personified. I still remember her blog post about the ways in which Race/Fail '09 wasn't a failure at all, because people of color in this community began to see that we weren't isolated at all, that we could be a force in each other's support. And because of great initiatives that started, such as publishing ventures and the challenge to read fifty books by authors of color in a year. In fact, I referenced her post in "Reluctant Ambassador." Hers went a long way towards shifting my generalized bad/traumatic feelings about Race/Fail '09 towards one of celebration."

"More recent writers who have knocked me dead include Roberto Bolaño, Ruth Ozeki, Sabrina Vourvoulias, Isabel Quintero and N. K. Jemison."

"Nassun gasps. “That’s horrible! I don’t bother to explain that just because something is horrible does not make it any less true."

"Honor in safety, survival under threat. Necessity is the only law."

"Would’ve been nice if we could’ve all had normal, of course, but not enough people wanted to share. So now we all burn."

"All energy is the same, through its different states and names. Movement creates heat which is also light that waves like sound which tightens or loosens the atomic bonds of crystal as they hum with strong and weak forces. In mirroring resonance with all of this is magic, the radiant emission of life and death."

"When we say that “the world has ended,” remember—it is usually a lie. The planet is just fine."

"You’re abbreviating heavily, not lying. That’s what you tell yourself."

"Put people in a cage and they will devote themselves to escaping it, not cooperating with those who caged them."

"It is surprising how refreshing this feels. Being judged by what you do, and not what you are."

"The Leadership legends have the air of a myth concocted to justify their place in society."

"Honor in safety, survival under threat. Better a living coward than a dead hero."

"My people didn’t use mysterious powers to track you; we used deduction. Much more reliable."

"Weapons have no need of friends."

"“Home is people,” she says to Asael, softly. Asael blinks. “Home is what you take with you, not what you leave behind.”"

"Syenite wonders if there is any point in hating a crazy man. It’s not like he’ll notice, anyway."

"Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall; Death is the Fifth, and master of all."

"“We will continue to serve you, Lady, whether you’re here or not. What prayers shall we say for you at the dawn and twilight hour?” She threw me an odd look, as if checking to see if I was joking. I wasn’t This seemed to surprise and unnerve her; she laughed, though it sounded a bit forced. “Say whatever you want,” she said finally. “Someone might be listening, but it won’t be me. I have better things to do.” She vanished."

"Mother always said that if one must do something unpleasant, one should do it wholeheartedly and not waste effort on regret."

"Peace is meaningless without freedom."

"At least I’m done with adolescence. Never could stand it; if I don’t want to kill someone, I want to have sex with them."

"Those with power would always find some way to exert it over those who didn’t."

"Fear was like poison to mortals; it killed their rationality."

"This was what I’d asked her to give me. I had no right to complain just because it wasn’t what I wanted to hear."

"If they will not love me, fear is an acceptable substitute."

"Magic is merely communication, after all. Communication, and conduits."

"Funny thing, employment. If you keep doing it, you keep getting paid."

"It was the oldest of tricks, to sow dissension between groups that had common interests. Good for deflecting attention from greater mischief, too."

"Unreasoning optimism is a fundamental element of childishness."

"“Even our mortal courtesans have been with gods enough to have acquired a certain ethereal technique.” He smiled a salesman’s smile, though it never once touched his eyes. “That’s what you’re selling. Not sex, but divinity.” I frowned. “Gods, Ahad, at least worship is free.” “It was never free.” His smile vanished. It hadn’t been real, anyway. “Every mortal who offered a god devotion wanted something in exchange for it—blessings, a guaranteed place in the heavens, status. And every god who demanded worship expected loyalty and more, in exchange. So why shouldn’t we be honest about what we’re doing? At least here, no god lies.”"

"I think you’re just so gods-damned certain of your own importance that you haven’t figured it out. So let me make this clear: I don’t care about you. You’re irrelevant. It’s a waste of my energy even to hate you!”"

"Well. Adolescence is all about making mistakes."

"The child in her wanted to do as she pleased, cling to impossible hopes. The woman in her wanted to make sound decisions, succeed even if it meant sacrifice. The woman would win; that was inevitable. But the child would not go quietly."

"It takes great strength to compromise, Shahar. More than it does to threaten and destroy, since you must fight your own pride as well as the enemy."

"I’d come down sick. (I had. It was called adolescence, an evil, evil disease.)"

"That was the way of things, after all. Children had to grow up. They did not always become what others wanted."

"It is a massive palace, each spire of which could house a village; its chambers contain dozens of entertainments. All of these become tedious to the point of torment after two thousand years. Hells, after twenty."