Quotes from Rachel Hartman

She still held sorrows, but she was not made of them. Her life was not a tragedy.

I did not understand that I carried loneliness before me on a plate, and that music would be the light illuminating me from behind.

If you have a personality, you're a person.

What's done cannot be undone.

You're making assumptions." "Deductions; and of course I am. It's my duty, as your friend.

True love was a time-honored way of escaping nearly everything—ogres, witches, bandits, tedious obligations. Her parents wouldn't like it, but surely even they had to acknowledge that love conquered all.

No matter how much you wanted to do right in this world, the world would find a way to crush you.

Love is a worthy motivation, although you see how quickly it can sour into guilt.

The hated innocent becomes hateful. Goodness withers when it is continuously ground underfoot.

The world is not enough for us without real work to do. The Saints mean to put you to some purpose. Pray, walk with an open heart, and you will hear the call. You will see your task shining before you, like a star.

I wish I could build you a cage, little bird, or a beautiful tower, to keep you safe from the corrupt, cynical world. You don't know how precious it is to be naive and innocent. I only want to protect you, so you can sing and be free like the golden bird you were born to be.

There was a great brightness and, um...Imagine what it would look like if you could see music, or thought.

It looked like our gods, to me--not literally, no the way they are depicted in statues, but the vibrant space between them, where Necessity is Chance and Chance flows into Necessity. The world is as it must be, and as it happens to be, and those are the same thing, connected and right, and you understand and love all of it, because you are all of it and all of it is you.

All is well--or could be, if we worked to make it so. We were the fingers of the world, putting itself to rights.

If it can be known, I want to know it.

Here's an analogy I like: guilt is a runaway wagon down the mountainside. It may carry you a long way, but it usually ends in disaster. Love, on the other hand, is much slower--just your own two feet, really," she said, casting a meaningful look at Tess. 'But it's more likely to take you somewhere worth going.

I experienced every wing beat as a terrifying drop followed by a stomach-lurching heave. I was sick over a glacier. Brisi watched with interest and screeched, "A thousand years from now, that will still be there, frozen in the ice. Unless a quig eats it.

You're stronger than you were when it happened.

Interpretation gives knowledge value, but it must evolve as new knowledge emerges. From a myriad incomplete truth, a greater whole.

Experiencing nothingness had left her feeling unexpectedly full.

Your life is not a tragedy. It's history, and it's yours.

There's honest work to be done, Johnny," whispered Griss. "The world is full of work, waiting for you.

there are people in this world who commit horrifying and unnatural acts beyond anything your naive imagination could conceive. He is your worst nightmare. Heed my warning and stay away from him. I

Beggars, alas, could not be choosers.