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“My greatest hope is that having known you were so loved as a child that you will be able to choose for your friends and companions people who love you for your own true self. That you will know how to give yourself a happier, kinder, more supportive and loving life than I knew how to give myself. Because I grew up with parents who did not know how to express their love for me, never having been given love themselves when they were children, I didn’t know how to give myself a loving, nurturing life as a grown-up. I pray that though I didn’t get to stay with you nearly long enough that somehow I have been able to help you feel so loved and valued in the time we had together that you will know that you are worthy to be loved and nurtured as an adult and that you, in turn, will be able to freely express your love and caring for others.”
― Genevieve Kingston, Did I Ever Tell You?

“Death could just come hurtling at you on any day and at any time, as it had with her.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Notes on Grief

“Hopefully in the next lifetime, we will meet again,” he said, glancing down at me. “And in kinder circumstances.” I gazed up and offered him a small smile. “I hope so, too.”
― June Hur, A Crane Among Wolves

“To be a boy opened doors that would never open for me, shielded him in a way where my own status as a woman had stripped me naked.”
― June Hur, The Red Palace