The Devil’s Opera Quotes

“You’ll see, should you live long enough, that pretending to be something you’re not was wasted on your youth.”
― A.R. Tapiero, The Devil’s Opera

“Have you ever been held by a man who didn’t want something from you? Who wasn’t trying to own you?”
― A.R. Tapiero, The Devil’s Opera

“Then hate me,” he says. “Hate me right when you wake up and as soon as you lay to rest. Hate me harder than you love anything else.” He rubs a palm up and down her spine, kissing the crown of her head. “One day you’ll realize, Valithia, that I will accept anything you offer me, even if it’s your hatred. For your hatred is better than never experiencing you at all.”
― A.R. Tapiero, The Devil’s Opera

“And as Damian moved in and out of her—seeming to find rapt delight in her body, given the sounds and praise he was vocalizing—she recalled what he said earlier: you are like the petals of a flower, opening to the dawn. But what is a flower to the Sun? Powerless. It doesn’t choose to bloom. It doesn’t choose its nature. It just responds—opens, because it must.”
― A.R. Tapiero, The Devil’s Opera

“And that’s the problem. Sometimes, she wishes he would just hit her. For a hand that lands is still proof of a hand. But it’s his quiet displeasure that strikes harder.”
― A.R. Tapiero, The Devil’s Opera

“What kind of woman is she to find a small comfort in her own tormentor? What is it, to take any crumb of affection you’re offered and tell yourself it’s a feast? Because even if it felt to be, love did not exist between their sheets. Only survival.”
― A.R. Tapiero, The Devil's Opera