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Sometimes They Would Sit In The Parlor Together, Both Reading – In Entirely Separate Worlds, To Be Sure, But Joined Somehow. When This Happened, Other People In The Family Couldn't Bring Themselves To Disturb Them. All That Could Be Heard In The Parlor Was The Sound Of Pages, Turning.

-Alice Hoffman

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Sometimes They Would Sit

Alice Hoffman

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Sometimes They Would Sit In The Parlor Together, Both Reading – In Entirely Separate Worlds, To Be Sure, But Joined Somehow. When This Happened, Other People In The Family Couldn't Bring Themselves To Disturb Them. All That Could Be Heard In The Parlor Was The Sound Of Pages, Turning.

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Sometimes They Would Sit In The Parlor Together, Both Reading – In Entirely Separate Worlds, To Be Sure, But Joined Somehow. When This Happened, Other People In The Family Couldn't Bring Themselves To Disturb Them. All That Could Be Heard In The Parlor Was The Sound Of Pages, Turning.

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Another World Must Surely Exist Somewhere One Where She Would Be Known In Some Deep Way That Was Far Beyond Words.

Being Human Means Losing Everything We Love Best In The World," She Murmured As She Released Me. "but Would You Ask To Be Anything Else?

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The Sisters Were Glad To Be Together. They Had The Easy Sort Of Relationship Where They Didn't Have To Speak To Be Understood.

Emily Brontë's "wuthering Heights" Was Extremely Important To Me.

It Wasn't Right To Have Someone Charge Into You Your World Without Even Asking, Acting As If You Were Nothing More Than An Egg To Be Flipped And Flopped, Sunny-side Up Or Scrambled, Depending On The Whims On Whoever Ran Your Life..._

No Barrier Was Strong Enough To Keep Out The Movement Of Time.

My Darling Girl, When Are You Going To Realize That Being Normal Is Not Necessarily A Virtue? It Rather Denotes A Lack Of Courage." - Aunt Frances

Unrequited Love Is So Boring. Weeping Under A Blue-black Sky Is For Suckers Or Maniacs.

Unrequited Love

When I Looked At Her, She Appeared To Be A Different Person From The One I'd Known... She Had Rewritten Everything, Our History Together, Our Friendship. Now I Was The Girl Who'd Stolen Andres; The Girl Who'd Lied To Her About Who I Was. Therefore, She Owned Me Nothing.

Pride Is A Funny Thing; It Can Make What Is Truly Worthless Appear To Be A Treasure.

At Midnight The Wind In The Tress Can Sound Like The Ocean. The Moonlight Can Make A Road Appear As Endless As The Sea.

The Adults Don't Know What's Happening On The Kids' Universe And The Kids Don't Know What's Happening On The Adults' Universe

Feel Lucky For What You Have When You Have It. Isn't That The Point? Happily Ever After Doesn't Mean Happy Forever. The Ever After, What Precisely Was That? Your Dreams, Your Life, Your Death, Your Everything. Was It The Blank Space That Went On Without Us? The Forever After We Were Gone?

It's Not Finding What's Lost, It's Understanding What You've Found.

The Best Way To Die Is When Your Living

How Could I Tell The Doctor What Was Wrong With Me? I Didn't Understand It Myself. I Couldn't Articulate The Pain; It Was The Pain Of Nothingness. My Fear Was Of The Weather, The Atmosphere, The Very Air. What Good Did Safety Tips Do Me Now? 'avoid Water, Metal Objects, Rooftops; Stay Off The Telephone In A Storm, Don't Think Glass Can Protect You; Even If A Storm Was 8 Miles Away, You're Still Not Safe From A Strike. Avoid Life Perhaps That Was The Answer. The Number One Safety Tip, Stay Away From It All.

I Read Betty Smith's "a Tree Grows In Brooklyn," All Of Shirley Jackson's Books, Which I Loved.

Young People Believe That Regret Is Something You Will Never Feel If You Simply Do As You Please, But Sometimes It Is A Matter Of Degree.

When I Write For Teens, I Feel I Can Cut Through Everything And Get To The Bare Bones. I Can Get Straight Into The Emotional World Of The Character.

Remember What I've Told You. Remember Me.

Do People Choose The Art That Inspires Them — Do They Think It Over, Decide They Might Prefer The Fabulous To The Real? For Me, It Was Those Early Readings Of Fairy Tales That Made Me Who I Was As A Reader And, Later On, As A Storyteller.

The Moon Is Always Jealous Of The Heat Of The Day, Just As The Sun Always Longs For Something Dark And Deep.

That's The Way Love Sounds, My Mother Told Me. You Think It Should Feel Like Honey, But Instead It Cuts Like A Knife.

I Have Nothing From My Childhood. I Think You Carry Those Books With You. It's Like In [ray] Bradbury's "fahrenheit 451." Books Are Outlawed In This Future Society So People Become The Book They Love By Memorizing It.

What Men Yearn For They Often Destroy.

Our Rest Is Formed By Our Waking Life And Our Waking Life Is Formed By Our Sorrows.

Still Anyone Who Trusts A Serpent Deserves Its Bite. The Wise See A Creature For What It Is, Not What It Says It May Be.

I Wasn't Quite As Certain That I Knew Her Soul. When It Came Right Down To It, I Wasn't Sure She Knew Me Either.

That Was The Way Love Was, Invisible, There Whether Or Not You Wanted To See It Or Admit To It.

It Was The Sort Of Beauty You Feel So Deeply It Becomes Contagious And Somehow Makes You Feel Beautiful Too.

Feeling Beautiful

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What People Read Revealed So Much About Them That She Considered Our Card Catalog A Treasure House Of Privileged Secrets; Each Card Contained The Map Of An Individual’s Soul.

I Was Beginning To Understand.my Grandmother's Love Was Cold Because She Was Afraid Of Things;that Was Why Everything Had To Be Perfect.

Every Problem Has A Solution, Although It May Not Be The Outcome That Was Originally Hoped For Or Expected.

Cleaning Up After Themselves Was A Low Priority For Margo And My Mother. They Had Both Recovered From Cancer Scares, Failed Marriages, And Lost Hope; In Their Opinion, Dirt Could Wait.

Be Careful What You Wish For. I Know That For A Fact. Wishes Are Brutal, Unforgiving Things. They Burn Your Tongue The Moment They're Spoken And You Can Never Take Them Back.

It Was A Great Escape For Me And It Was A Way To Take A Break From What Was Going On In My Own World, To Go Into Another World.

Trouble Is Just Like Love, After All; It Comes In Unannounced And Takes Over Before You've Had A Chance To Reconsider, Or Even To Think.

Everything Was Red, The Air, The Sun, Whatever I Looked At. Except For Him. I Fell In Love With Someone Who Was Human. I Watched Him Walk Through The Hills And Come Back In The Evening When His Work Was Through. I Saw Things No Woman Would See: That He Knew How To Cry, That He Was Alone. I Cast Myself At Him, Like A Fool, But He Didn't See Me. And Then One Day He Noticed I Was Beautiful And He Wanted Me. He Broke Me Off And Took Me With Him, In His Hands, And I Didn't Care That I Was Dying Until I Actually Was.

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Perhaps It Is Possible To Discover More In Silence Than In Speech. Or Perhaps It Is Only That Those Who Are Silent Among Us Learn To Listen.

It Was As Though I Had One Map Inside My Head And It Led To The Man Who Was Waiting For Me. Someone Who Was Alone - Maybe Even More Alone - Than I Was.

That Is How You Know You've Left Childhood Behind-when You Wish For Time To Go Backward.

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Anyway, The Sort Of Love That Will Not Wait Is Probably Best To Pass By

Some Things You Cannot Wish Away Or Think Away. They Become Part Of You When You Remember Them.

There Are Some Things, After All, That Sally Owens Knows For Certain: Always Throw Spilled Salt Over Your Left Shoulder. Keep Rosemary By Your Garden Gate. Add Pepper To Your Mashed Potatoes. Plant Roses And Lavender, For Luck. Fall In Love Whenever You Can.

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I Read "the Group" By Mary Mccarthy. It Had Tons Of Sex In It, Or So I Thought At The Time.

Let Everyone See The Blood,' He Said. 'don't Clean It Up. That's The Only Way People Remember.'... I Could See The Blood Inside My Head. It Was With Me Forever, Whether Or Not I Wanted To Forget.

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I Wept To Think That Life Went On Even When So Much Had Been Lost, That Rain Still Fell And Myrtle Grew Between The Rocks.

Weapons Are Kept From Women, But Such A Naming Suggests That Perhaps Men Fear Our Talents In War As Well As Our Desire For Peace.

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You Have To Choose The Voice You Are Going To Trust. You Can't Listen To Everyone.

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People Want To Ignore What They Can't Understand. They're Looking For Logic At Any Cost.

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Most People Know That Ray Bradbury Is One Of My Favorite Authors.

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What Was A Rose But The Living Proof Of Desire, The Single Best Evidence Of Human Longing And Earthly Devotion. But Desire Could Be Twisted,after All, And Jealousy Was The Name Of The Rose That Did Well In Arid Souls.

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She Was So Busy Forgetting, She Couldn't Take A Single Step Into The Future.

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Every Time I Finish A Book, I Forget Everything I Learned Writing It - The Information Just Disappears Out Of My Head

Forget Everything

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I Feel As If When You Love A Book It Becomes A Part Of You Whether You Have It On Your Shelves Or Not.

I Didn’t Want To Be Prideful Anymore. I Wanted To Be As Hard As And Brittle As The Stones I Carted Into The Woods. Stones That Could Not Feel Or Cry Or See. I Wished Not To Feel Anything At All. In No Time, What I Wished For, I Became.

He Has The Ability To Catch Someone By The Way That He Looks At Her, And Make Her Wish He Would Go On Looking.

I Can't Really Work On More Than One Thing At A Time

One Thing At A Time

Every Fairy Tale Had A Bloody Lining. Every One Had Teeth And Claws.

She Knows Where She's Going, And What She Has To Do. She Could, After All, Find Her Way To Route 95 South Blindfolded. She Could Do It In The Dark, In Fair Weather Or Foul; She Can Do It Even When It Seems She Will Run Out Of Gas. It Doesn't Matter What People Tell You. It Doesn't Matter What They Might Say. Sometimes You Have To Leave Home. Sometimes, Running Away Means You're Headed In The Exact Right Direction.

He Believed In Dreams, In Endings That People Told You Could Never Happen, In Disappointments Reversed And Luck That Lasted.

Jill And I Have Known Each Other Our Whole Lives. One House Separates Our Houses But We Act As If It Doesn't Exist. We Met Before We Were Born And We'll Probably Still Know Each Other After We Die. At Least, That's The Way We're Planning It.

A Boy Who Is Trouble Is Something Entirely Different As A Man.

My Mother's Blood That Would Last Forever After. The Blood Of My Brother, My Grandfather, My Father.

My Grandmother Was Overwhelmed By What Was Happening To Us. She Ahd Moved Back Into The Past Because The Here And The Now Was Too Terrible.

Margaret Thought Of All She Knew For Certain, That Day Would Always Follow Night That Love Was Never Wasted Nor Was It Lost.

The More You Feel, The Stronger You Are.

Sometimes The Right Thing Feels All Wrong Until It Is Over And Done With.

Any Weapon Touched By A Woman, Even By Accident, Must Be Cleansed With Both Water And Prayer So That Her Essence Would Not Linger, Diverting The Warrior Who Might Use It Next, For Even The Faintest Touch Could Bring Lust To That Man's Heart. Perhaps That Meant A Woman Who Was Well Trained In Arms Would Be The Superior Warrior, Her Attention Never Wavering From Her Task.

Good Fortune Can Take Forever To Get To You, But As It Turns Out, Sorrow Is As Quick As A Shot.

Do What You Want, Do What You Will, Do What You Have To, Do What You Think You Cannot.

I Really Feel Like The Gift Is Also The Curse. It's Always Half-and-half. Whatever Brings You The Most Joy Will Also Probably Bring You The Most Pain. Always A Price To Pay

Holding A Tear Back Makes Them Drain Upward, Higher And Higher, Until One Day Your Head Just Explodes And You're Left With A Stub Of A Neck And Nothing More.

Love Is Worth The Sum Of Itself, And Nothing More.

Some Things, When They Change, Never Do Return To The Way They Once Were. Butterflies For Instance, And Women Who've Been In Love With The Wrong Man Too Often.

...he Had A Way Of Taking Your Hand Which Made It Clear He'd Have To Be The One To Let Go." From Alice Hoffman's "local Girls", Pg.102.

If We Had Paid Attention, We Would Have Understood There Are Some Things In This World You Cannot Outrun.

A Red Map Isn't Easy To Follow. Any Document Made Of Blood And Bones Is Tricky. Wrong Turns Are Easily Made, And There Are Often Piles Of Stones In The Road. A Person Has To Disregard Time And Sorrow And All The Damage Done. If You Follow, If You Dare, The Thread Always Leads To Whomever Or Whatever You've Forgotten.

I'm Much Faster Now. When You Only Have A Certain Amount Of Time To Write, After A While You Learn To Use Your Time Well Or You Stop Writing

What Did You See?' He Asked Then. Nothing,' I Told Him. 'because Nothing Is What You Wanted Me To See, Though The Man On The Table Might Disagree.

My Mother, Abra, Had Taught Me That All People Are Made From The Same Dust. When Our Days Here Are Gone, All Men And Women Enter The Same Garden.

The Only People Out At This Hour Were Ones Who Couldn't Sleep,those Haunted By One Thing Or Another:love Thwarted, Love Lost, Love Thrown Away. They Were The Sort Of People Who Didn't Want To Be Noticed, Who Wanted To Slip Through Shadows, Be Alone With Their Despair.

But What We Are Given Is Taken As Well, So That We Know God's Glory Comes To Us From His Will Alone.

Only Her Death Could Prove Her Innocence; A Circle Of Impossible, Deathly Judgement.

Before She Realized He Was Next To Her, He Had Placed His Hands Over Hers On The Countertop, Then Hooped His Fingers Through Hers. Gretel Looked Up At Him, So Startled She Might As Well Have Been Shot. 'i Just Wanted To Wake You Up', He Said. Which Is Exactly What He Did. One Look At Him And Her Heart Was Racing. One Look, And Whatever Had Been Before Was All Over.

I Feel Like My Eyes Are Killing Me At The End Of The Day And That I Shouldn't Use Them.

The End Of The Day

Love Was Like That, Like A Dream You Didn't Quite Understand, One In Which You Didn't Necessarily Know What You Were Looking At Until It Was Right In Front Of You.

She Can Feel His Blood, Just Beneath His Skin; When He Breathes, The Air Fills With Smoke. He's Like A Dragon, Ancient And Fearless.

You Can Try To Take Sorrow And Make It Into Something Enduring, Meaningful And Beautiful. I Always Feel Guilty That This Is My Job, That I Get To Do This

One Of My Favorites Is "time And Again" By Jack Finney. It Takes Place In Manhattan And Goes Back And Forth Between 1882 And The 1950s. It's Really A Cult Book.

Real Love, After All, Was Worth The Price You Paid, However Briefly It Might Last.

They Say That Dogs May Dream, And When Topsy Was Old, His Feet Would Move In His Sleep. With His Eyes Closed He Would Often Make A Noise That Sounded Quite Human, As If Greeting Someone In His Dreams. At First It Seemed That He Believed Sara Would Return, But As The Years Went By I Understood That His Loyalty Asked For No Reward, And That Love Comes In Unexpected Forms. His Wish Was Small, As Hers Had Been -- Merely To Be Beside Her. As For Me, I Already Knew I Would Never Get What I Wanted.

I Think Growing Up Is Difficult And It's A Process That I'm Always Interested In, With Kids And Adults, They Are Often On Two Different Universes.

I Also Like The Whole Idea Of Fairy Tales And Folk Tales Being A Woman's Domain, Considered A Lesser Domain At The Time They Were Told.

Sometimes Words Drew Blood, They Cut Your Tongue, They Made You Know Things You Couldn't Unknow.

I Never Plot Out My Novels In Terms Of The Tone Of The Book. Hopefully, Once A Story Is Begun It Reveals Itself

People Hide Their Truest Nature. I Understood That; I Even Applauded It. What Sort Of World Would It Be If People Bled All Over The Sidewalks, If They Wept Under Trees, Smacked Whomever They Despised, Kissed Strangers, Revealed Themselves?

Everything We Knew Condemned Us, And Our Questioning Condemned Us Most Of All. Knowledge Was The Way Of Our People, And Knowledge Was Dangerous. It Was The First Thing That Freed You And The Thing That Put You In Peril. It Was The Key To The Ten Gates. I Saw Them Clearly Now, Each And Every One, The Gates That Were There For Me. Ashes, Bones, Grass, Heart, Stone, Love, Sorrow, Blood, Earth, Sky.

The Sky Is Already Purple; The First Few Stars Have Appeared, Suddenly, As If Someone Had Thrown A Handful Of Silver Across The Edge Of The World.

Fairytales Were Maps Formed Of Blood And Hair And Bones; They Were The Knots Of The Sub-conscious Unwound. Every Word In Every Tale Was Real And As True As Apples And Stones. They All Led To The Story Inside The Story.

After A While, The Characters I'm Writing Begin To Feel Real To Me. That's When I Know I'm Heading In The Right Direction

I Have Crossed Over To A Place Where I Never Thought I’d Be. I Am Someone I Would Have Never Imagined. A Secret. A Dream. I Am This, Body And Soul. Burn Me. Drown Me. Tell Me Lies. I Will Still Be Who I Am.

Once You Know Some Things, You Can't Unknow Them. It's A Burden That Can Never Be Given Away.

I Heard A Sigh, As Though The Books Were Breathing. I Felt That This Was Where I Belonged. This Was Where I Lived.

Sometimes Movies Really Are The Best Medicine.

He Stepped Off The Pavement Like A Man Jumping Off A Bridge, As Calm As A Swimmer With An Ocean Out Below. Lucy Had Known What He Was Going To Do The Instant Their Eyes Met. She'd Know What He Intended Because She Would Have Done The Very Same Thing If She'd Had His Courage. Nothing Was Going To Break His Fall.

You Can Never Tell About A Person By Guessing...that's Why Language Was Invented. Otherwise, We'd All Be Like Dogs, Sniffing Each Other To Find Out Where We Stood.

She Was Disappearing A Little More Each Day, So Thin, So Frail, A Wisp Of Smoke. One Day She Would Surely Vanish Altogether, And There Was No Way To Stop Her.

I'm A Really Eclectic Reader.

He Fell In Love With The Way She Closed Her Eyes, Long Before He Fell In Love With Her.

When I Walk, I Walk With You. Where I Go, You're With Me Always.

I Always Felt And Still Feel That Fairy Tales Have An Emotional Truth That Is So Deep That There Are Few Things That Really Rival Them

Always Keep Mint On Your Windowsill In August, To Ensure That Buzzing Flies Will Stay Outside, Where They Belong. Don't Think The Summer Is Over, Even When Roses Droop And Turn Brown And The Stars Shift Position In The Sky. Never Presume August Is A Safe Or Reliable Time Of The Year.

In A World Of Sorrow, Love Was An Act Of Will. All You Needed Were The Right Ingredients.

You Can't Dispute The Ridiculous. You Can't Argue Reasonably With Evil.

In "faithful," Ray Bradbury Is Discussed A Lot. The Characters Read "the Illustrated Man."

My Theory Is That Everyone At One Time Or Another Has Been At The Fringe Of Society In Some Way: An Outcast In High School, A Stranger In A Foreign Country, The Best At Something, The Worst At Something, The One Who's Different. Being An Outsider Is The One Thing We All Have In Common.

When All Is Said And Done, The Weather And Love Are The Two Elements About Which One Can Never Be Sure.

My Sorrow Is I Used To Read All The Time And Now, As A Writer, I Don't Have The Time To Read.

The Original Fairy Tale Was About The Youngest Sister Going Into A Room In The Castle And Finding All The Bodies Of The Wives That Came Before Her - She Is Confronted With Truth, Thinking About How Often We Think We Know People And We Really Don't.

They Weren't True Stories; They Were Better Than That.

...and So Many Orchards Circled The Village That On Some Crisp October Afternoons The Whole Wold Smelled Like Pie.

Every Time Someone Forgets, Someone Else Disappears,' My Brother Wrote.

The Evening Had Turned Sweet And Blue.

Are People Drawn To Each Other Because Of The Stories They Carry Inside?

Just Because Something Is Unspoken Doesn't Mean That It Disappears.

Sometimes, Running Away Means You're Headed In The Exact Right Direction.

Unfinished Business Always Comes Back To Haunt You, And A Man Who Swears He'll Love You Forever Isn't Finished With You Until He's Done.

Unfinished Business

Maybe A Hundred Years Ago Our People Should Have Run Away From This Place, I Said... And Then Run From The Next Place And The Next Place And The Place After That? You Run Once, What Makes You Think You Won't Have To Run All The Rest Of Your Life?... We Love Moment To Moment... Everything Changes. One Minute We Are Part Of The River, And The Next We Are Joined With The Sea.

Those You Love Will Not Drown Or Burn. They Will Fly Away.' ...'now We Both Have People We Love Who Are Like Birds. They Have Flown Far From Anything In This World That Can Hurt Them. They're Flying Away Still.

She Liked To Disappear, Even When She Was In The Same Room As Other People. It Was A Talent, As It Was A Curse.

The Weak Are Cruel. The Strong Have No Need To Be.

I Wrote To Find Beauty And Purpose, To Know That Love Is Possible And Lasting And Real, To See Day Lilies And Swimming Pools, Loyalty And Devotion, Even Though My Eyes Were Closed, And All That Surrounded Me Was A Darkened Room. I Wrote Because That Was Who I Was At The Core, And If I Was Too Damaged To Walk Around The Block, I Was Lucky All The Same. Once I Got To My Desk, Once I Started Writing, I Still Believed Anything Was Possible.

Sally...can No Longer Think Of Love As A Reality, Or Even As A Possibility, However Remote.

I Know Who You Are In Your Heart,' Andres Said. 'that's All That Matters.' And That Was It. That Was The Moment. Now I Knew How I Would Feel If I Ever Lost Him. That Was How You Knew Love. My Mother Had Told Me That. All You Had To Do Was Imagine Your Life Without The Other Person, And If The Thought Alone Made You Shiver, Then You Knew.

I Loved Him Even Now, As He Took A Knife To My Throat, As I Drowned In Blood, As I Whispered "cousin, You Were Wrong. We Were Born To Live.

It Was As If Hope Had Appeared Out Of Nowhere To Settle Beside Her And It Wasn't Going Anywhere, It Wasn't Going To Desert Her Now.

This Day Is Going To Be Awful. It's The Sort Of Day You Wouldn't Mind Losing Completely, Even If It Meant Your Life Would Be Twenty-four Hours Shorter.

And Then I Understood That She Had No Idea What She'd Done To My Family. She Thought Love And Hatred Were Equal.

Are People Drawn To Each Other Because Of The Stories They Carry Inside? At The Library I Couldn’t Help But Notice Which Patrons Checked Out The Same Books. They Appeared To Have Nothing In Common, But Who Could Tell What A Person Was Truly Made Of? The Unknown, The Riddle, The Deepest Truth. I Noticed Them All: The Ones Who’d Lost Their Way, The Ones Who’d Lived Their Lives In Ashes, The Ones Who Had To Prove Themselves, The Ones Who, Like Me, Had Lost The Ability To Feel.

I Always Quit At Three When My Kids Come Home From School So I Feel Pretty Spoiled

Do You Ever Just Put Your Arms Out And Just Spin And Spin And Spin? Well, That's What Love Is Like; Everything Inside Of You Tells You To Stop Before You Fall, But For Some Reason You Just Keep Going.

No One Knows How To Write A Novel Until It's Been Written

I Wrote To Find Beauty And Purpose, To Know That Love Is Possible And Lasting And Real.... Once I Got To My Desk, Once I Started Writing, I Still Believed Anything Was Possible.

Maybe Some Love Was Guaranteed. Maybe It Fit Inside You And Around You Like Skin And Bones.

Hearts Were Made For Being Broken. There's Really No Way Around It If You Want To Be A Human Being.

You Can Be Betrayed In Your Sleep. The Whole World Can Tilt While You're Dreaming Of Butterflies.

You Are Only Worthy Of What You Prove Yourself To Be.

Proving Yourself

You Build Your World Around Someone, And Then What Happens When He Disappears? Where Do You Go-into Pieces, Into Atoms, Into The Arms Of Another Man? You Go Shopping, You Cook Dinner, You Work Odd Hours, You Make Love To Someone Else On June Nights. But You're Not Really There.

Some Fates Are Guaranteed, No Matter Who Tries To Intervene.

What I Like About Fairy Tales Is The Language And The Matter-of-fact Way Of Introducing Magic, Where It's Accepted That A Fox Could Talk Or A Gate Could Just Appear In A Wall. I Think Fairy Tales Are So Psychological.

I Dream Of A Love That Even Time Will Lie Down And Be Still For.

He'd Thought He Was Lost, But Now He Recognized That Eternity Was Around Him, Like Salt From A Shaker Or Stars In The Sky.

I've Been A Screenwriter For Twenty-five Years. Every One Of My Books Have Been Optioned For Movies And I Have Written A Few Of Those Screenplays.

In Losing A Friend, She Is Reminded Of All She Has Lost And All She Stands To Lose Again. There Is Nothing To Be Done To Make It Any Easier. We All Grieve Alone.

I Love Fairy Tales And Feel Very Affected By Them.

[fairy Tales] Are Like A Journey To The Woods And The Many Ways You Can Get Lost. Some People Say It's Not A Good Idea To Read Fairy Tales To Anyone Under The Age Of Eight Because They Are Brutal And Raw. When I Was A Kid I Often Felt That Kids's Books Were Speaking Down To Me, But I Never Felt That Way About Fairy Tales. They Are Bloody And Scary, But So Is Life.

This Kind Of Knowing You Can Never Tell To Anyone. If You Want Us To Survive, You Cannot Trust A Soul'... 'not For Any Reason On This Earth. You Can Never Tell.

Even As A Small Child, I Understood That Woman Had Secrets, And That Some Of These Were Only To Be Told To Daughters. In This Way We Were Bound Together For Eternity.

Others Said May Was Best, That Sweet Green Time When Lilacs Bloomed And Gardens Along Main Street Were Filled With Sugary Pink Peonies And Dutch Tulips.

Crying Wasn't Like Riding A Bike. Give It Up, And You Quickly Forget How It's Done.

This Was What It Meant To Be Human, To Know That Time Moved And All Things Changed.

I Don't Think I Make Much Of A Distinction Between The 'real' And The 'fantastic.' They Both Seem To Be Threads In The Same Cloth As Far As I'm Concerned.

I Don't Really Read As Much As I Used To. A Lot Of What I Was Looking For As An Escape I Find In Writing. And The Other Thing Is That I Don't Want To Get Into Someone Else's Language When I'm Working

You Don't Fight For Peace Sister,' Nahara Told Me, 'you Embrace It.

Women Know Things That Men Will Never Know. We Keep The Best Secrets. We Tell The Best Stories.

I Think Love Is A Huge Factor In Fiction And In Real Life. Is There A Risk? Always. In Fiction And In Life

I Never Even Believed In Happiness. I Didn't Think It Existed. Now Look At Me. I'm Ready To Believe In Just About Anything.

Our House Was Littered With Books- In The Kitchen, Under The Beds, Stuck Between The Couch Pillows--far Too Many For Her The Ever Finish. I Suppose I Thought If My Grandmother Kept Up Her Interests, She Wouldn't Die; She'd Have To Stay Around To Finish The Books She Was So Fond Of. "i've Got To Get To The Bottom Of This One," She'd Say, As If A Book Were No Different From A Pond Or A Lake. I Thought She'd Go On Reading Forever But It Didn't Work Out That Way.

Being An Outsider Is The One Thing We All Have In Common.

I Just Finished Colson Whitehead's "the Underground Railroad," Which I Think Is A Work Of Genius.

Love Was Like Rain: It Turned Into Ice, Or It Disappeared. Now You Saw It, Now You Couldn't Find It No Matter How Hard You Might Search. Love Evaporated; Obsession Was Realer; It Hurt, Like A Pin In Your Bottom, A Stone In Your Shoe. It Didn't Go Away In The Blink Of An Eye. A Morning Phone Call Filled With Regret. A Letter That Said, Dear You, Good-bye From Me. Obsession Tasted Like Something Familiar. Something You'd Known Your Whole Life. It Settled And Lurked; It Stayed With You.

We Are Only An Instant, That's True. But We Are Eternal.

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