Quotes About Family

Fuck you," Sally says. She tosses the words off, easy as butter in her mouth, but in fact she doesn't think she's ever cursed out loud in her own house before. "Fuck you twice," Gillian says. "You need it more.

They may be nothing like you, he had written, they may surprise you, they may even repel you when their behavior is out of control, when they climb out their windows and drink underage and break every rule, but you will love them in a way you had not thought possible before, no matter who they turn out to be.

She doesn't have a mother anymore. There's no one to whom she's the most important person in the world.

Our house was littered with books- in the kitchen, under the beds, stuck between the couch pillows--far too many for her the ever finish. I suppose I thought if my grandmother kept up her interests, she wouldn't die; she'd have to stay around to finish the books she was so fond of. I've got to get to the bottom of this one, she'd say, as if a book were no different from a pond or a lake. I thought she'd go on reading forever but it didn't work out that way.

And then I understood that she had no idea what she'd done to my family. She thought love and hatred were equal.

In my family, a book can be a life raft.

I loved him even now, as he took a knife to my throat, as I drowned in blood, as I whispered Cousin, you were wrong. We were born to live.

I only had access to him when we were together in the library, and I loved them both -the library and my father- equally and without question.

Abra DeMadrigal didn't look young enough to be my sister anymore. Her sorrow weighed her down and aged her. She was still beautiful, but she looked very far away. No wonder our people had raven eyes, so distant, so sad. No matter how wise she was, my mother looked like a woman who hadn't truely believed how much evil there was in our world. Not until this moment.

Love more, her aunt had said. Not less.

When people related by blood were so careful with each other, when they were so very polite, there was soon nothing left to say. Only niceties that meant so little they might as well have been spoken to a complete stranger. Pass the butter, open the door, see you after school, there's rain again, it's sunny, it's cold. Has the dog eaten? Has the window been shut? Where are you going? Why is it I don't know you at all? Such statements did not add up to anything like a family...

There are none who can fight as fiercely as a mother and a daughter, and none who can forgive more completely.

My grandmother was overwhelmed by what was happening to us. She ahd moved back into the past because the here and the now was too terrible.

When you have a sister, someone knows the story of who you were and who you would always be.

When you have lost your mother you have lost the world.

Men will be men, Maureen told me when I wondered aloud where my father went in the evenings. Don't complain, she advised. That's how women find their freedom. When there's no one else at home.

I knew that my brother would still be a part of this world no matter what happened next. I felt my love for him so deeply that my blood seemed to flow down the street to him. My blood sang out my prayer for Luis even while he was still living in our world.

We must do as we're told, Ava reminded her. We will honor your mother and follow her instructions. Because she is your maker? Lea asked, her heart breaking. Ava shook her head. Because she is yours.

Your grand daughter may not be looking for trouble, but trouble is looking for her.

My father told us that our people had been slaves in the desert and because God had seen fit to set us free, none among us should ever own another man. It had been written that every man belonged to God and no one else. But did women belong to God or to the men of their family? They could not own property or businesses; only their husbands could have that honor.

Who can you trust if not your sister? Who knows your story better than she? If you saw one Owens sister at the grocery, the other would be right beside her. If one was working in the garden, making certain the rows of herbs were weeded, her sister would be there as well, carrying a basket to collect the dandelion greens.

But the best stories were about their mother, how her hair was as red as blood, how she had seventy-four freckles on her face, how she was a ferryboat captain's daughter who believed that people could fly.

It's for your own good," she said tenderly. "All I want for you is a normal life." "Mother," Franny sighed. "What makes you think that's what I want?

She read the color-coded series of Andrew Lang's fairy tales to her mother. They became lost in an enchanted cottage with vines growing over the window. It was dark and it was quiet and they could hear each other softly breathing. Every story had the same message: what was deep inside could only be deciphered by someone who understood how easily a heart could be broken.