Danielle Shelley > Danielle's Quotes

“Woke up this morning with a terrific urge to lie in bed all day and read.”
― Raymond Carver

“How often have I warned you against fraternizing with technology?”
― Gail Carriger, Etiquette & Espionage

“We women are a sad lot, aren't we?"
"What do you mean?"
"Strong enough to take on the world with our bare hands, yet we permit ridiculous boys to make fools of us."
"I am not a fool."
"No, you're not. Not yet.”
― Renee Ahdieh, The Wrath and the Dawn

“I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.”
― Jorge Luis Borges

“Most likely Pistons," said Pillover in a resigned tone of voice. "You told them about the ball. They like to go to events uninvited, put gin in the punch, and steal all the spoons. Stylish shenanigans like that."
"Charming," said Sophronia.”
― Gail Carriger, Etiquette & Espionage

“I have never attempted to hide that I have had two husbands in my life.
I have, however, neglected to mention that in between them, I had a wife.”
― Marie Brennan, The Voyage of the Basilisk

“This will sound peculiar, I know. But this love I have for dragons, my compulsion to understand them ... I have thought of it before as though there were a dragon within me. A part of my spirit. I do not believe it is true in any mystical sense, of course; I am as human as you are. But in the metaphorical sense, yes. 'Dragon-spirited' is a good a term for me as any."

He listened to this in silence, his expression settled into the grave lines it assumed when he was deep in thought. "Do you believe you are neither male nor female?"

I almost gave a malapert answer, but caught myself in time. We had an established habit of intellectual debate, and I valued it; I would not discard it now.

"So long as my society refuses to admit of a concept of femininity that allows for such things," I said, "then one could indeed say that I stand in between.”
― Marie Brennan, The Voyage of the Basilisk

“You've gotta dance like there's nobody watching,
Love like you'll never be hurt,
Sing like there's nobody listening,
And live like it's heaven on earth.”
― William W. Purkey

“One could not blame a people for disliking vampires. Vampires were like brussels sprouts - not for everyone and impossible to improve upon with sauce.”
― Gail Carriger, Prudence

“Felix looked as if he had been given some kind of caped weasel—part gift, part insult, part utter confusion. “Thank you, I think.”
― Gail Carriger, Waistcoats & Weaponry

“You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children.”
― Madeleine L'Engle

“It was Stephano, or, if you prefer, it was Count Olaf. It was the bad guy.”
― Lemony Snicket, The Reptile Room

“Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility, or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation. The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock. Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can't remember a single word she said. This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, the law, or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.

You see? If all you remember in years to come is the 'gay wizard' joke, I've come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock. Achievable goals: the first step to self-improvement.”
― J.K. Rowling, Very Good Lives: The Fringe Benefits of Failure and the Importance of Imagination

“One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality. That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives. It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people’s lives simply by existing.”
― J.K. Rowling, Very Good Lives: The Fringe Benefits of Failure and the Importance of Imagination