I imagine it’s always easier to do something monstrous if you can convince yourself you aren’t going to, up to the last minute, until you do.

— Naomi Novik, The Golden Enclaves

All the love in the world , and still not enough for us;

-archivesoflonging

Men often described the girl as having hair the color of wheat. Others called it the color of caramel, or occasionally the color of honey. The girl wondered why men so often used food to describe women's features. There was a hunger to such men that was best avoided.

— Brandon Sanderson, Tress of the Emerald Sea

Love wasn’t enough and trying wasn’t enough and nothing we did changed anything! It should have mattered. All that love and all that trying should have changed … something…

— T. Kingfisher, Thornhedge

One of the great tragedies of life is knowing how many people in the world are made to soar, paint, sing, or steer—except they never get the chance to find out.

— Brandon Sanderson, Tress of the Emerald Sea

Some men's childhoods are permitted to last forever, but women are so often reminded that there is work to be done.

— Taylor Jenkins Reid, Carrie Soto Is Back

Just because you’re adequately good at something doesn’t mean that’s what you should do.

— Ling Ma, Severance

I was made for the library, not the classroom. The classroom was a jail of other people’s interests. The library was open, unending, free.

— Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me

I liked how he said my name. As if the syllables were the first notes to a song he loved to sing.

— Elizabeth Lim, Six Crimson Cranes

"A strong man does not want a mirror of himself in a wife, Miss Donovan," he said. "The man who fears a confident woman is a man whose true fear is his own weakness being challenged."

— Martha Keyes, The Art of Victory (The Donovans #1)

A boring truth will always have difficulty competing with an exciting lie.

— Brandon Sanderson, Tress of the Emerald Sea

My life was life a dusty shelf in a old bookstore, where every volume was exactly where it had been for ages, the only discernible change being that my body has aged another ten ages.

— Mieko Kawakami, Breasts and Eggs

Even small actions have consequences. And while we can often choose our actions, we rarely get to choose our consequences.

— Brandon Sanderson, Tress of the Emerald Sea

You must understand that this is a tale about people who are both what they seem and not what they seem. Simultaneously. A story of contradictions. In other words, it is a story about human beings.

— Brandon Sanderson, Tress of the Emerald Sea

The gaze requires no words at all; it is an honest meeting.

— Caleb Azumah Nelson, Open Water

Besides, sometimes, to resolve desire, it's better to let the thing bloom. To feel this thing, to let it catch you unaware, to hold onto the ache. What is better than believing you are heading towards love?

— Caleb Azumah Nelson, Open Water