Honeybee Quotes

“When we don’t think we’re worth much, we find ways to make our world small. We don’t allow ourselves to hope because we’ve already excepted failure. And this pattern of thinking often determines the outcome of our most important choices. But Sam, I have to tell you that doubt and confidence are both acts of faith. They’re both predictions of our capabilities. We either tell ourselves that we can or that we can’t. And these beliefs are a self-fulfilling prophecy, because we validate our doubts by giving up just as much as we are embolden ourselves by refusing to give in. The only way you can break this cycle is to be brave. You have to ignore your doubts and risk failure. You have to try to achieve something that seems unachievable. This is the best recipe for confidence. And confidence is how we get how we start giving ourselves permission to take up more space in the world, to want more for ourselves, and to feel as though we deserve it.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“Find out who you are, and live that life.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“Look at me. You’re not on your own, Sam. Whatever you’re feeling, someone else has felt it. Whatever you’re going through, someone else has gone through it. And if we haven’t, we can do our best to understand.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“But you don’t think I’m a freak or anything?’ ‘Mate, I think you’re just you, and there’s nothing the matter with that.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“And I’m not wrong, I’m me. And I don’t want to be invisible anymore. I want people to see who I am”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I forgot what it felt like to be young”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I wasn't cold, but I was shivering when I walked onto the Clayton Road overpass. I wasn't scared either, even when I climbed over the rail. I didn't feel much of anything.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“It’s all yours, Honeybee. This is your home.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“Then I saw that he had taken the pills from both silver sheets. He had swallowed them all. I started to cry. ‘It’s alright, mate,’ Vic said. ‘It’s alright.’ ‘I don’t want you to die.’ ‘It’s time. It’s time.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“Edie’s diaries made me realise life was made up of lots of small moments that you could control and a few big ones that you couldn’t.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“And I knew that I would go to war too if it meant coming home to someone.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“A few times the landlord changed the locks with all our things inside. My mum would call her friend Dave, who was a locksmith, and he would get us back in. Then she sent me outside to play for an hour while she said thank you to Dave.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“She was my best mate. And when she died, I died too. My life went with hers, because it was our life that mattered, not my own.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“He was a beautiful man. He loved you.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I love you, Vic.’ ‘I love you too, mate.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“You were more than love. You were my life.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I love you,’ I said. ‘Goodbye.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“Like, I know I'm unbearably obnoxious at home, but I'm actually pretty shy out there. I'm like the chubby quiet brown girl who is decent academically, but who never risks venturing an opinion. It's weird, because, like, in a world full of frost giants and dwarves and demons and spellcasting, my fantasies were really about being a confident, decisive person who had their shit together and was listened to.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“When you’re a young bloke, you think about your life in terms of possibilities. The job you’ll have, the man you’ll be, places you’ll go. But when you get older, the way you think changes. You think about the stuff you’ve done, how you’ve done it, where you’ve gone.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“Vic left you everything he owned. This house, everything in it. It’s yours. He had a few thousand left in his savings account too. That will be transferred to you.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“He stepped into the room without my help. He opened Edie’s wardrobe and went through her clothes. Then he took one of her white nightgowns off a hanger. He held it to his face and he breathed it in. Then he leaned over and laid it out flat on Edie’s side of the bed.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I wasn’t a good person. I stole things. I betrayed people who were nice to me. I was a burden to my mum. I had been born wrong and I couldn’t be fixed.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“There was an actress called Grace Kelly in it.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I wanted to message my mum later to tell her that I was sorry, and to say goodbye. I opened the window. Then I climbed out. And that’s when I met Vic.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“What should we call you?’ I didn’t even think. I just blurted it out. ‘Honeybee,’ I said. ‘Call me Honeybee.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I watched every episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I still thought I was the only person in the world who behaved this way, but one night I got curious. I googled do other boys dress up like girls? and there were over a billion results. I thought it must be a mistake, so I clicked on a few of the sites that had come up. That’s how I discovered drag.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“It’s okay. You’ll get the next one, Honeybee.’ Steve lost his temper. ‘Stop treating him like a baby.’ ‘Excuse me?’ ‘Stop coddling him. He messed up. He needs to learn.’ ‘Don’t tell me how to raise my son.’ Steve snatched the fishing rod out of my hand. ‘My parents didn’t raise a son, they raised a man. Calling him fucking Honeybee and protecting his feelings isn’t going to help him grow up.’ ‘Well I’ve been doing this longer than you.’ ‘Fine. Keep wrapping him in cotton wool. I don’t give a shit.’ Steve started the boat and took us back to shore and didn’t speak to either of us for the rest of the day. After that, she never called me Honeybee again.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee

“I looked at the road below. It was a long way down. I focused on the spot where I would probably land, between the white line and the brown gravel. I wondered if it would hurt or if I would die straight away. Then I wondered who would find me. Maybe it would be a truck driver or a shift worker. I felt bad for them.”
― Craig Silvey, Honeybee