“No. I’m not hot, and I don’t want to do the Squeaky Dance.” Simon sighed. This day was full of disappointments.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“The Dimwit's Guide to the Female Mind might assist your efforts in understanding human females. But it must be pointed out that this subject can be a dangerous adventure and should be undertaken with extreme caution. After all, human males have been trying to understand their females for generations, and most of the time they come away from these encounters looking like someone stuck their tails into an electric socket.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“One store owner said he was going to leave a dictionary on a public bench so the vandals could at least spell the obscenities correctly. It”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“What are you going to call them?” Meg asked. “Lunch?” Simon offered. The female pack gave him a look that made him think running away would be a good idea, if he wasn’t the leader and couldn’t back down.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“He gently kissed that scar and felt something changing inside him - just a flutter of change, there and gone, but leaving its mark.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“She swallowed hard. “I want to try skinny-dipping.” He was so still, she wasn’t sure he was even breathing.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“The police have no leads as yet on the person or persons who painted obscene suggestions on the buildings. One store owner said he was going to leave a dictionary on a public bench so the vandals could at least spell the obscenities correctly.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“While he waited, he made up the bed,more to discourage Meg from falling back into it than because he wanted to tidy the room. Besides, running his hands over the sheets and breathing in her scent made him happy,”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“He didn't understand why everyone fussed about taking clean clothes out of a drawer. Underclothes smelled a lot more interesting after the female wore them.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“He hadn’t observed Kowalski or Debany licking their mates’ hands.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“And the things we girls need because no one wants to run out of those supplies in the middle of a blizzard.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“You always believed we could survive in the outside world. I'm doing everything I can to give at least some of us a chance of not only surviving but truly living.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“The first card was a beautifully rendered but terrifying representation of what Henry guessed was one of the Elders’ forms. Next was half a Wolf cookie. Last was a card that had a simple drawing of a smiley face. “That is sooooo wrong,” Merri Lee said, shuddering. “Yes, it is.” Henry picked”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“Do you know what the Sharkgard call humans on a ship?> ”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“And when one kind of animal overruns an area to the point where many kinds of animal begin to starve, it’s up to the predators to thin out the herds before there’s nothing left for anyone. That’s a simple truth whether you’re talking about deer or humans.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“Six flashlights turned on, beacons that said, We’re here, come eat us!”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“We’re going to destroy Cel-Romano. I wanted you to know that before you die,” Stavros said. “You upstart infestation. You thought you could wipe out the terra indigene? It’s your species that is going to wither—and you will be one of the things the survivors, if there are any, can thank for that.” He released Scratch and floated a safe distance away as dozens of the Sharkgard rushed in to strike the enemy, consuming the human piece by piece. A foot. A hand. A forearm. A thigh.”
― Anne Bishop, quote from Marked in Flesh
“He put his lips to my ear and said, “He hurts you, I’ll fuck him up.”
Loved my big brother.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from Rock Chick Revolution
“Steven’s words slush together as he gets to his feet. “Crossing this one off the bucket list.” Then he
unbuckles his belt and grabs the waist of his pants—yanking the suckers down to his ankles—tighty
whities and all.
Every guy in the car holds up his hands to try to block the spectacle. We groan and complain. “My
eyes! They burn!”
“Put the boa constrictor back in his cage, man.”
“This is not the ass I planned on seeing tonight.”
Our protests fall on deaf ears. Steven is a man on a mission. Wordlessly, he squats and shoves his lilywhite
ass out the window—mooning the gaggle of grannies in the car next to us.
I bet you thought this kind of stuff only happened in movies.
He grins while his ass blows in the wind for a good ninety seconds, ensuring optimal viewage. Then
he pulls his slacks up, turns around, and leans out the window, laughing. “Enjoying the full moon, ladies?”
Wow. Steven usually isn’t the type to visually assault the elderly.
Without warning, his crazy cackling is cut off. He’s silent for a beat, then I hear him choke out a single
strangled word.
“Grandma?”
Then he’s diving back into the limo, his face grayish, dazed, and totally sober. He stares at the floor.
“No way that just happened.”
Matthew and I look at each other hopefully, then we scramble to the window. Sure enough, in the
driver’s seat of that big old Town Car is none other than Loretta P. Reinhart. Mom to George; Grandma to
Steven.
What are the fucking odds, huh?
Loretta was always a cranky old bitch. No sense of humor. Even when I was a kid she hated me.
Thought I was a bad influence on her precious grandchild.
Don’t know where she got that idea from.
She moved out to Arizona years ago. Like a lot of women her age, she still enjoys a good tug on the
slot machine—hence her frequent trips to Sin City. Apparently this is one such trip.
Matthew and I wave and smile and in fourth-grader-like, singsong harmony call out, “Hi, Mrs.
Reinhart.”
She shakes one wrinkled fist in our direction. Then her poofy-haired companion in the backseat flips
us the bird. I’m pretty sure it’s the funniest goddamn thing I’ve ever seen.
The two of us collapse back into our seats, laughing hysterically.”
― Emma Chase, quote from Tied
“The dragon flew up and settled in the crook of Mina’s hood, and quickly became invisible again.
“I don’t trust that thing,” Jared shot back.
“Relax, I find him quite cute. Isn’t that right, Ander?” She held up a finger and felt the invisible dragon rub its face against her.
“Great, you’ve named it, now you’re gonna want to keep it. But I’m telling you that thing better be house-trained.” He turned to the bookshelf and began to pull open the book to open the hidden exit door.
Mina felt Ander leave her shoulder but didn’t let Jared know he was missing. She saw Constance’s teacup float mysteriously above Jared’s head. She clapped her hand over her mouth to contain the laughter. A second later the cup turned over, spilling lukewarm tea on Jared’s unsuspecting head.
“Oh, it better not have just peed on me!” he screamed.”
― Chanda Hahn, quote from Fable
“Why does any human want anyone? My body recognises you as something that’s good for me. My mind recognises you as someone who’s right for me, and my soul recognises you as someone who is meant for me.”
― Tillie Cole, quote from Sweet Home
“... [T]hose who most seem to be themselves appear to me people impersonating what they think they might like to be, believe they ought to be, or wish to be taken to be by whoever is setting standards. So in earnest are they that they don't even recognise that being in earnest -is the act-. For certain self-aware people, however, this is not possible: to imagine themselves being themselves, living their own real, authentic, or genuine life, has for them all the aspects of a hallucination.
I realise that what I am describing, people divided in themselves, is said to characterise mental illness and is the absolute opposite of our idea of emotional integration. The whole Western idea of mental health runs in precisely the opposite direction: what is desirable is congruity between your self-consciousness and your natural being. But there are those whose sanity flows from the conscious -separation- of those two things. If there even -is- a natural being, an irreducible self, it is rather small, I think, and may even be the root of all impersonation -- the natural being may be the skill itself, the innate capacity to impersonate. I'm talking about recognising that one is acutely a performer, rather than swallowing whole the guise of naturalness and pretending that it isn't a performance but you. . . . All I can tell you with certainty is that I, for one, have no self, and that I am unwilling or unable to perpetrate upon myself the joke of a self. It certainly does strike me as a joke about -my- self. What I have instead is a variety of impersonations I can do, and not only of myself -- a troupe of players that I have internalised, a permanent company of actors that I can call upon when a self is required, an ever-evolving stock of pieces and parts that forms my repertoire. But I certainly have no self independent of my imposturing, artistic efforts to have one. Nor would I want one. I am a theater and nothing more than a theater.”
― Philip Roth, quote from The Counterlife
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