The Rose and the Beast: Fairy Tales Retold
Quotes from the Book
You are in my blood. I can't help it. We can't be anywhere except together.
What sexual preference do you hope she has?” “Happiness.” Isnt that cool?
Love is a dangerous angel.
He kissed her. A kiss about apple pie a la mode with the vanilla creaminess melting in the pie heat. A kiss about chocolate, when you haven't eaten chocolate in a year. A kiss about palm trees speeding by, trailing pink clouds when you drive down the Strip sizzling with champagne. A kiss about spotlights fanning the sky and the swollen sea spilling like tears all over your legs.
Under the pink Harlequin sunglasses strawberry dangling charms, and sugar-frosted eyeshadow she was really almost beautiful.
You are my Marilyn. You are my lake full of fishes. You are my sky set, my 'Hollywood in Miniature,' my pink Cadillac, my highway, my martini, the stage for my heart to rock and roll on, the screen where my movies light up.
Weetzie could see him--it was a man, a little man in a turban, with a jewel in his nose, harem pants, and curly-toed slippers. "Lanky Lizards!" Weetzie exclaimed. "Greetings," said the man in an odd voice, a rich, dark purr. "Oh, shit!" Weetzie said. "I beg your pardon? Is that your wish?
Sometimes she wore Levi's with white-suede fringe sewn down the legs and a feathered Indian headdress, sometimes old fifties' taffeta dresses covered with poetry written in glitter, or dresses made of kids' sheets printed with pink piglets or Disney characters.
He was so handsome,but he didn't look well.He reminded her of a cigarette.
She knew they were all afraid. But love and disease are both like electricity, Weetzie thought. They are always there -- you can't see or smell or hear, touch or taste them, but you know they are there like a current in the air. We can choose, Weetzie thought, we can choose to plug into the love current instead.
Grief is not something you know if you grow up wearing feathers with a Charlie Chaplin boyfriend, a love-child papoose, a witch baby, a Dirk and a Duck, a Slinkster Dog, and a movie to dance in. You can feel sad and worse when your dad moves to another city, when an old lady dies, or when your boyfriend goes away. But grief is different. Weetzie’s heart cringed in her like a dying animal. It was as if someone had stuck a needle full of poison into her heart. She moved like a sleepwalker. She was the girl in the fairy tale sleeping in a prison of thorns and roses.
It’s so sick,” Duck said. “I nicked myself shaving that last night at home, and I saw my own blood and I thought, How could I live in a world where this exists—where love can become death? Even if the doctor says we’re okay, how could we go on watching people die?” Duck buried his face against Dirk’s shoulder and the streetlamp light shone in through the window, lighting up Duck’s hair. Dirk stroked Duck’s head. “I don’t know. But we’ve got to be together,” he said.
I don't know about happily ever after...but I know about happily.
She was the girl in the fairy tale, sleeping in a prison of thorns and roses. "Wake up," My Secret Agent Lover Man said, kissing her. But she was suffocated by roses that no one else saw -- only their shadows showed on her lips and around her eyes.
Your dad's dead. But you aren't, baby.
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About Francesca Lia Block
More by Francesca Lia Block
All books by Francesca Lia Block →About the book
In 1989 Francesca Lia Block made a dazzling entrance into the literary scene with what would become one of the most talked-about books of the decade; Weetzie Bat. This poetic roller coaster swoop has a sleek new design to match its new sister and brother books, Goat Girls and Beautiful Boys. Rediscover the magic of Weetzie Bat, Ms. Block's sophisticated, slinkster-cool love song to L.A., the book that shattered the standard, captivated readers of all generations, and made Francesca Lia Block one of the most heralded authors of the last decade.
This could be a book about cheap cheese and bean burritos, slinkster dogs, lanky lizards and rubber chickens ...Or strawberry sundaes with marshmallow toppings, surfing, stage-diving and sleeping on the beach ...It could even be a book about magic. But what it's definitely about is Weetzie Bat, her best friend Dirk and their search across L.A. f
Book details
- First published
- 1989
- Author
- Francesca Lia Block
- Genre
- Fiction
- Goodreads rating
- 3.75 (15k ratings)
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