Jenn ~ Smalltown Bookworm

“I think about the way that we met, and then much later the way I assumed she was dead, after five months of radio silence—about how all you want to do in response to grief is talk about it but all everyone assumes you want to do is talk about anything else.”
― Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea

“Whenever the old people got quieter in their volume and more precise in their words, Joan had learned to shut the hell up. So she did.”
― Cherie Dimaline, Empire of Wild

“Something I find incredibly boring, Sam said, is everyone’s conviction that love is different for them. Somehow harder. Do you know what I mean? I just don’t think it’s that complicated, honestly – if you’re with the wrong person, it’s hard. It’s just another way of thinking you’re special, the way everyone does when they’re a teenager. You think you aren’t able to love, except that of course you are. You think you aren’t able to love correctly or the same as everyone else, except that of course you are, you just haven’t had a chance to do it yet. You’re not special, you’re just waiting.”
― Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea

“I feel exhausted, a feeling of catching up, a feeling of something finding me. My heart is a thin thing, these days—shred of paper blown between the spaces in my ribs.”
― Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea