Melissa

“Why books?”

Her brows rose. “I beg your pardon?”

“Why are they your vice?”

She set her plate down and wiped her hand on her skirts before reaching for the top volume on a stack of small, leather bound books nearby and extending it to him. “Go on.”

He took it. “Now what?”

“Smell it.” He tilted his head. She couldn’t help but smile. “Do it.”

He lifted it to his nose. Inhaled.

“Not like that,” she said. “Really give it a smell.”

He raised one brow but did as he was told.

“What do you smell?” Sophie asked.

“Leather and ink?”

She shook her head. “Happiness. That’s what books smells like. Happiness. That’s why I always wanted to have a book shop. What better life than to trade in happiness?”
― Sarah MacLean, The Rogue Not Taken

“You are better for every book you've read.”
― Sarah MacLean, The Rogue Not Taken

“I like the way he looks at me, like I am a wood nymph that he happened upon one day and just had to take home to keep.”
― Jenny Han, Always and Forever, Lara Jean

“We are not broken things, neither of us. We are cracked pottery mended with laquer and flakes of gold, whole as we are, complete unto each other. Complete and worthy and so very loved.”
― Mackenzi Lee, The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue