Melissa Mitchell > Melissa's Quotes

“People had to grow on their own, make their own decisions, good and bad. It was those mistakes and the choice or refusal to learn from them that gave life—and art—their texture, their meaning. It had to be a choice.”
― Shveta Thakrar, Star Daughter

“Sheetal glanced at her reflection one more time. The silver-tressed, brown-skinned girl before her stared back, powerful. Soft and sturdy as spider silk. Mistress of herself. A hint of starry fire smoldered in her eyes like a signal.”
― Shveta Thakrar, Star Daughter

“It was like wearing the night sky, if the sky were gems and sparkle and all the incandescent promise of the myriad constellations.”
― Shveta Thakrar, Star Daughter

“She’d fallen for Kohl, wrapping her life around his to the point where it nearly killed her, all because he’d shown her some kindness. He’d promised her the world, he’d promised she’d never fall again—and then he’d removed the world from under feet so all she could do was fall.”
― Francesca Flores, Diamond City

“When love was the last thing given on Kosín’s streets, it was hard to tell the real thing from something toxic.”
― Francesca Flores, Diamond City

“It’s a risk, but...people die in this city every day no matter what their religion is, and Inosen die whether we hide or not. If your life is at risk no matter what, then you have a choice of either hiding or doing something about it. I’m done with hiding and saving myself while other people suffer.”
― Francesca Flores, Diamond City

“Aina didn’t say anything for a long time, her thoughts spinning. Kill or be killed. Magic or industry. Nothing could coexist—steel and smoke never left room for nuance.”
― Francesca Flores, Diamond City

“I always thought that gardeners’ daughters couldn’t thrive where our roots didn’t grow. But maybe we were like dandelion tuffs.”
― Ashley Poston, Among the Beasts & Briars

“The back of my neck went cold. I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping I was still dreaming, that if I shut my eyes I’d wake up back in bed, and if I shut my eyes again I’d wake up in my room at Saint Brigid’s, and from there I could shut my eyes and wake up a child again, somewhere in some house just like this one, but where I’d be happy.”
― Rose Szabo, What Big Teeth

“I sat with that for a long time. I thought of every person I had met, wondering how many of them had wolves inside them and just had never pulled them out. Or perhaps more horrible: how many of them, in a moment of fear, reached inside themselves for something to save them, and came up empty.”
― Rose Szabo, What Big Teeth

“I don’t tell him that’s how it always begins: in selfishness, in ambition, in lust or desperation. That love starts out as something you want to bite into and ends as something that swallows you up.”
― Rose Szabo, What Big Teeth

“All she could see were the little girl’s eyes. The ghastly reflection of the firebird in them, looming and monstrous. A creature of legend. A creature that, one day, Asya would become.”
― Alexandra Overy, These Feathered Flames

“Just as her mother had taught her, Izaveta had turned everyone into playing pieces in her own game. For better or worse, there was no turning back now. Even if she was no longer certain she knew the difference between fighting for the right reasons and fighting for power.”
― Alexandra Overy, These Feathered Flames

“How was it that her sister had been taken to live with a monster, but somehow Izaveta had become one? A creature molded by her mother’s manipulations, by the constant betrayals of the court. Asya might have a monster beneath her skin, but Izaveta had one in her heart—in her very essence. So much a part of herself that she no longer knew how to separate one from the other.”
― Alexandra Overy, These Feathered Flames

“Iwas the one who would do anything to keep her sister safe, no matter the cost. Not because she was braver or stronger—certainly not because she was kinder—but because she was selfish. Because seeing Asya suffer hurt more than suffering herself.”
― Alexandra Overy, These Feathered Flames

“She went to grab her scarlet cloak before remembering it was still in Valleyda. One shaky sigh, that she’d left it there, but a marriage was more than a cloak. As for the other reasons she’d kept it—the claiming of who she was, what she was—she didn’t need a cloak for that anymore, either. She knew it in her bones, she wore it in her eyes instead of on her shoulders.”
― Hannah F. Whitten, For the Wolf

“I want the roots…I understand what it means, and I want them anyway, because I am for the Wolf, and the Wolves are for the Wilderwood.”
― Hannah F. Whitten, For the Wolf

“People with power resent losing it, and too much power for too long a time can make a villain of anyone.”
― Hannah F. Whitten, For the Wolf

“Maybe this is a cruel mercy, to spare him from servitude only to chain him to me instead.”
― Natalie Mae

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― Andrea Robertson, Forged in Fire and Stars

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― Andrea Robertson, Forged in Fire and Stars

“Listen, Miss Priss,’ she said, sitting upright. ‘Not all of us want to preserve ourselves between two pages like a wilted old flower all the time. You and Bennett might get your kicks reading about old dead men and their old dead men thoughts, but I want to live a little before all the good living is used up.”
― Jenny Elder Moke, Curse of the Specter Queen

“Sam had thought to protect herself from the pain of that loss by turning away from life, but this half life was like its own death. In order to live—to truly, fully live—she had to embrace all aspects of life, even the danger looming over them now.”
― Jenny Elder Moke, Curse of the Specter Queen

“Those were gilded memories, highlighted in precious tones of golden summer sunlight and the deep, rich sent of freshly turned earth.”
― Jenny Elder Moke, Curse of the Specter Queen

“I took in the smudges of ink and charcoal on his rolled sleeves, the windswept hair neatly gathered at his nape, his dark eyes, somehow brighter every time I saw them. Kiki was right, he wasn’t so much the barbarian I’d pictured.”
― Elizabeth Lim, Six Crimson Cranes

“To this day, cranes carry the strands of our fate. They say that each time two people’s paths cross, so do their strands. When they become important to one another or make a promise to one another, a knot is tied, connecting them.”
― Elizabeth Lim, Six Crimson Cranes

“I would not have you be alone, Lina, not in your joys or your sorrows. I would wish your strand knotted to mine, always.”
― Elizabeth Lim, Six Crimson Cranes

“Now I saw in his eyes the richness of summer soil. His nose looked endearingly ruddy from being in the cold, and his voice was like a favorite song I never tired of hearing. Funny how he’d stolen his way into my heart when I’d been the thief the day we met.”
― Elizabeth Lim, Six Crimson Cranes

“Can’t be done no other way. You fixin’ somethin’ for somebody you love, for this healin’. Gotta do it with your bare hands and your whole heart. Understand?”
― Kalynn Bayron, This Poison Heart

“Quiet plants might perk up around me, but they didn’t uproot themselves or destroy a fence to get close to me. They didn’t turn obscene shades of their natural colors when I was around.”
― Kalynn Bayron, This Poison Heart