← Fantasy

Mechanica

by Betsy Cornwell · 2015

Nicolette’s awful stepsisters call her “Mechanica” to demean her, but the nickname fits: she learned to be an inventor at her mother’s knee. Her mom is gone now, though, and the Steps have turned her into a servant in her… more

14 quotes ★ 3.60 (4,811) Fantasy

Quotes from the Book

Everything was a broken line for me in those days. I was slipped into the empty spaces between words.
10
When your heart is broken, it’s easier to follow rules
10
I brought my hand to the back of his neck and leaned into him, sliding my fingers into the curls at his nape. His arms clasped tighter around me. I sighed just a little against his mouth, feeling that it was almost too much, all this newness, this feeling that there was space and light inside me I’d never noticed before. Every part of me down to my fingertips felt like reworked glass, melting into some new shape, my edges beginning to glow. I wanted to do nothing but change this way, pressed against his body, his warmth and goodness, forever.
5
you had to be willing to forget what it had done before and look for what it could do.
3
I do the same with my books...Nothing like a good argument in the margins with someone who's already said all they have to say on the subject.
3
My motrher says friendship should be slowly and carefully cultivated, like a rose garden, like a romance in a story. That every reason you care about someone should be rational. She says I care too quickly. But friendship has never been somenting I could do halfway
3
I have to believe it’s right to be a warm voice, a companion if I can be, as soon as ever I find a friend.
3
A whole life could change, and change again, in the smallest fraction of forever.
2
Now was a time not to anger, but for survival. I would survive. I knew that was all I could do.
2
The cracks grew over him like vines, faster and faster. At first he bucked, whinnying metallic screeches. Then he gradually stilled, looking up at me with frightened glass eyes. He was growing. New, molten glass leeched out between his fissures, cooled and hardened only to crack again and make room for more liquid glass. The gears inside him moaned and creaked, and metal filings gathered at the base of his transparent stomach, only to fly up again and form more joints and chains and gears. Black smoke poured from his nostrils. Soon he was the size of a large dog, then a man, and still he grew and grew until he towered over my bed, as big as any plow horse I’d ever seen. Glass dripped down his flanks like sweat, a few rivulets still glowing with molten heat.
2
Sometimes you have to put things away for a while.
1
and even making beads reminded me that there were other things in life besides handsome young men with kind smiles and soft lips.
1
I had no idea how one day could contain so much happiness and despair at once.
1
One must always account for the vagaries of truth.

About Betsy Cornwell

We have collected 14 quotes from 1 book by Betsy Cornwell on BookQuoters.

More about the author →

About the book

Nicolette’s awful stepsisters call her “Mechanica” to demean her, but the nickname fits: she learned to be an inventor at her mother’s knee. Her mom is gone now, though, and the Steps have turned her into a servant in her own home.

But on her sixteenth birthday, Nicolette discovers a secret workshop in the cellar and begins to dare to imagine a new life for herself. Could the mysterious books and tools hidden there—and the mechanical menagerie, led by a tiny metal horse named Jules—be the key to escaping her dreary existence? With a technological exposition and royal ball on the horizon, the timing might just be perfect for Nicolette to earn her freedom at last.

Gorgeous prose and themes of social justice and family shine in this richly imagined Cinderella retelling about an indomitable inventor who finds her prince . . . but realizes she doesn't want a fairy tale happy ending aft

Book details

First published
2015
Genre
Fantasy
Goodreads rating
3.60 (5k ratings)

Keep reading