Bailey

“Most of what she knew, she'd learned from the wild. Nature had nurtured, tutored, and protected her when no one else would. If consequences resulted from her behaving differently then they too were functions of life's fundamental core. Tate's devotion eventually convinced her that human love is more than the bizarre mating competitions of the marsh creatures. But life also taught her than ancient genes for survival still persist in undesirable forms among the twists and turns of man's genetic code. For Kya it was enough to be part of this natural sequence as sure as the tides. Kya was bonded to her planet and its life in a way few people are. Rooted solid in this earth. Born of this mother.”
― Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing

“lot of times love doesn’t work out. Yet even when it fails, it connects you to others and, in the end, that is all you have, the connections.”
― Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing

“Jodie had taught her that the female firefly flickers the light under her tail to signal to the male that she's ready to mate. Each species of firefly has its own language of flashes. As Kya watched, some females signed dot, dot, dot, dash, flying a zigzag dance, while others flashed dash, dash, dot in a different dance pattern. The males, of course, knew the signals of their species and flew only to those females. Then, as Jodie had put it, they rubbed their bottoms together like most things did, so they could produce young.

Suddenly Kya sat up and paid attention: one of the females had changed her code. First she flashed the proper sequence of dashes and dots, attracting a male of her species, and they mated. Then she flickered a different signal, and a male of a different species flew to her. Reading her message, the second male was convinced he'd found a willing female of his own kind and hovered above her to mate. But suddenly the female firefly reached up, grabbed him with her mouth, and ate him, chewing all six legs and both wings.

Kya watched others. The females all got what they wanted – first a mate, then a meal – just by changing their signals.

Kya knew judgment had no place here. Evil was not in play, just life pulsing on, even at the expense of some of the players. Biology sees right and wrong as the same color in different light.”
― Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing

“It was a truth universally acknowledged, Alys suddenly thought with a smile, that people enter our lives in order to recommend reads.”
― Soniah Kamal, Unmarriageable