“My children ain’t the only thing I love. If I was allowed, I reckon I’d love myself, too.”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“At night, before she went to sleep in her cabin down in the quarters, she remembered Mawu’s story and told herself that she was a god, a powerful god. Each and every day, she reminded herself of this so that she wouldn’t fall backward. She was more than eyes, ears, lips, and thigh. She was a heart. She was a mind”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“The woman had told the truth. The flowers were the color of sunset. And not the yellowish tinge of a lazy sun either, but the intense orange of a sun refusing to set on anyone else’s terms.”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“Mawu felt her face where the still-fresh scar had just been opened up again. She examined the blood on her fingers as if it weren’t her own. Sir returned to the table and a servant slipped through the side door and passed him a wet cloth to wipe the blood from his hands.”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“plans if you were going to go with this woman? come here.”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“Sweet allowed her pregnancy to get the better of her and simply sat down. Reenie’s lips set into a straight, emotionless line. Mawu no longer talked back, the words she did speak taking on an air of vapidity. Philip was chained at night, no longer trusted. So it was no wonder that Lizzie sought out the white woman then.”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“What is the denunciation with which we are charged? It is endeavoring, in our faltering human speech, to declare the enormity of the sin of making merchandise of men,—of separating husband and wife,—taking the infant from its mother, and selling the daughter to prostitution,—of a professedly Christian nation denying, by statute, the Bible to every sixth man and woman of its population, and making it illegal for ‘two or three’ to meet together, except a white man be present! What is this harsh criticism of motives with which we are charged?”
― Dolen Perkins-Valdez, quote from Wench
“Kind of a Straight For You Thing?”
― Jack L. Pyke, quote from Backlash
“There is no point in delaying crying. Sadness is like having a vicious alligator around. You can ignore it for only so long before it begins devouring things and you have to pay attention.”
― Lemony Snicket, quote from Why Is This Night Different from All Other Nights?
“Cap’n don’t like us tellin’ tales,” another man added.
“That’s just ‘round his girl, is all,” the storyteller replied.
Camille ceased breathing and widened her eyes. They were right about her father banning such rubbish aboard his ships, but she’d never known she was the reason for it. Why did he feel the need to protect her from them? The few parts of stories she had managed to overhear were entertaining but obvious malarkey to scare young sailors ut of their wits.
“If he thinks she’s too fine for them, he shouldn’t bring her along,” Lucius said, his sneer reaching through to his tone of voice.
“This is her last time, ain’t it?” another sailor asked.
Her stomach cramped at the unwelcome reminder.
“If it is, I wager it’ll be Kildare’s, too. He won’t stick ‘round no more,” another chuckled. Camille’s ears perked at Oscar’s name, then reddened at the sailor’s implication that Oscar was there only for her. It was absurd.
“Good,” Lucius replied. “Who will be our new first mate?”
What were they going on about? Oscar was a perfect first mate. Her father had groomed him for it. Oscar couldn’t just…leave.
“Well, it won’t be you, Drake. You can’t even make a shroud knot!”
The sailors in the fo’c’sle burst out in laughter. Grabbing her chance to leave, Camille took off down the corridor until their laughter faded with the sighs of the ship.”
― Angie Frazier, quote from Everlasting
“I'd rather be in danger with you than be safe without you.”
― Fuyumi Ono, quote from The Twelve Kingdoms: Sea of Shadow
“You see and hear that they lie,” said Ivan Ivanovitch, turning over on the other side, “and they call you a fool for putting up with their lying. You endure insult and humiliation, and dare not openly say that you are on the side of the honest and the free, and you lie and smile yourself; and all that for the sake of a crust of bread, for the sake of a warm corner, for the sake of a wretched little worthless rank in the service. No, one can’t go on living like this.”
― Anton Chekhov, quote from Racconti
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