The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

by V.E. Schwab

“I’m afraid all selections are final,” he says, scraping butter over toast. “You’ll have to try again tomorrow.” Tomorrow. The word swells a little in her chest.

Blink and you’re twenty-eight, and everyone else is now a mile down the road, and you’re still trying

to find it, and the irony is hardly lost on you that in wanting to live, to learn, to find yourself, you’ve gotten lost.

I remember seeing that picture and realizing that photographs weren’t real. There’s no context, just the illusion that you’re showing a snapshot of a life, but life isn’t snapshots, it’s fluid. So photos are like fictions. I loved that about them. Everyone thinks photography is truth, but it’s just a very convincing lie.”