Vanessa > Vanessa's Quotes

“There is a primal reassurance in being touched, in knowing that someone else, someone close to you, wants to be touching you. There is a bone-deep security that goes with the brush of a human hand, a silent, reflex-level affirmation that someone is near, that someone cares.”
― Jim Butcher, White Night

“Perhaps a wish was just a hope with better aim.”
― Matt Haig, A Boy Called Christmas

“Children can have a cruel, absolute sense of justice. Children can kill monsters and feel quite proud of themselves.”
― Holly Black, The Darkest Part of the Forest

“Know Thyself. It’s good advice. Know yourself. You are worth knowing. Examine your life. The unexamined life is not worth living. Be aware that other people have equal significance. Give them the space to make their own choices, and let their choices count as you want them to let your choices count. Remember that excellence has no stopping point and keep on pursuing it. Make art that can last and that says something nobody else can say. Live the best life you can, and become the best self you can. You cannot know which of your actions is the lever that will move worlds. Not even Necessity knows all ends. Know yourself.”
― Jo Walton, The Just City

“A half-read book is a half-finished love affair.”
― David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas

“The love of learning, the sequestered nooks,
And all the sweet serenity of books”
― Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“The love of books is among the choicest gifts of the gods.”
― Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

“All that I hope to say in books, all that I ever hope to say, is that I love the world.”
― E.B. White

“Perhaps they were right putting love into books. Perhaps it could not live anywhere else.”
― William Faulkner

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”
― Martin Luther King Jr., A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches

“I have decided to stick to love...Hate is too great a burden to bear.”
― Martin Luther King Jr., A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”
― Martin Luther King Jr., I Have a Dream: Writings and Speeches That Changed the World

“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

“If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

“But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars.”
― Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

“Intelligence plus character-that is the goal of true education.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

“She wears trouble like a crown. If she ever falls in love, she’ll fall like a comet, burning the sky as she goes.”
― Holly Black, Black Heart

“Girls like her, my grandfather once warned me, girls like her turn into women with eyes like bullet holes and mouths made of knives. They are always restless. They are always hungry. They are bad news. They will drink you down like a shot of whisky. Falling in love with them is like falling down a flight of stairs. What no one told me, with all those warnings, is that even after you’ve fallen, even after you know how painful it is, you’d still get in line to do it again.”
― Holly Black, Black Heart

“But now I wonder--what if everyone is pretty much the same and it's just a thousand small choices that add up to the person you are? No good or evil, no black and white, no inner demons or angels whispering the right answers in our ears like it's some cosmic SAT test. Just us, hour by hour, minute by minute, day by day, making the best choices we can.
The thought is horrifying. If that's true, then there's no right choice. There's only choice.”
― Holly Black, Black Heart

“Mine. The language of love is like that, possessive. That should be the first warning that it's not going to encourage anyone's betterment.”
― Holly Black, Black Heart

“You got a lot of ladies to get through. You’re still young. First love’s the sweetest, but it doesn’t last.”

“Not ever?” I ask.

Grandad looks at me with a seriousness he reserves for moments when he wants me to really pay attention. “When we fall that first time, we’re not really in love with the girl. We’re in love with being in love. We’ve got no idea what she’s really about—or what she’s capable of. We’re in love with our idea of her and of who we become around her. We’re idiots.”
― Holly Black, Black Heart

“The easiest lies to tell are the ones you want to be true.”
― Holly Black, White Cat

“The truth is messy. It's raw and uncomfortable. You can't blame people for preferring lies.”
― Holly Black, Red Glove

“I know what you are going to say: sticks, stones, and broken bones, but words can kick you in the gut. They wriggle underneath your skin and start to itch. They set their hooks into you and pull. Words accumulate like a cancer, and then they eat away at you until there is nothing left. And once they are let loose there really is no taking them back.”
― John David Anderson

“Great heroes need great sorrows and burdens, or half their greatness goes unnoticed. It is all part of the fairy tale.”
― Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn

“The true secret in being a hero lies in knowing the order of things. The swineherd cannot already be wed to the princess when he embarks on his adventures, nor can the boy knock on the witch's door when she is already away on vacation. The wicked uncle cannot be found out and foiled before he does something wicked. Things must happen when it is time for them to happen. Quests may not simply be abandoned; prophecies may not be left to rot like unpicked fruit; unicorns may go unrescued for a very long time, but not forever. The happy ending cannot come in the middle of the story.”
― Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn

“Lay down your roots now,
let them wrap tight around mine,
sink deep in the soil.”
― Tyler Knott Gregson, All the Words Are Yours: Haiku on Love

“Don't look back and don't run. You must never run from anything immortal. It attracts their attention.”
― Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn

“After all, words are what remain when all the deeds have been done. Words can shatter faith; start a war; change the course of history. A story can make your heart beat faster; topple walls; scale mountains - hey, a story can even raise the dead. And that's why the King of Stories ended up being the King of the gods; because writing history and making history are only the breadth of a page apart.”
― Joanne Harris, The Gospel of Loki