The evening had turned sweet and blue.

My darling girl, when are you going to realize that being normal is not necessarily a virtue? It rather denotes a lack of courage." - Aunt Frances

Others said May was best, that sweet green time when lilacs bloomed and gardens along Main Street were filled with sugary pink peonies and Dutch tulips.

It was a great escape for me and it was a way to take a break from what was going on in my own world, to go into another world.

Be careful what you wish for. I know that for a fact. Wishes are brutal, unforgiving things. They burn your tongue the moment they're spoken and you can never take them back.

I wonder how a lioness will manage in a dovecote. Can you put away your teeth and claws?

The weak are cruel. The strong have no need to be.

Once you know some things, you can't unknow them. It's a burden that can never be given away.

This was what it meant to be human, to know that time moved and all things changed.

No one knows you like a person with whom you've shared a childhood. No one will ever understand you in quite the same way.

Still anyone who trusts a serpent deserves its bite. The wise see a creature for what it is, not what it says it may be.

One day you're going to look back and wonder why you wasted so much time worrying about things that never mattered much.

It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.

He didn't seem to realize that three excuses was as good as no excuse.

Nevertheless, one learned very early that books had to be respected; they were all putative Bibles and to some small degree had a share in holiness.

We built this country by making things, by producing goods we could sell.

But it is good to be several floors up in the dead of night wondering whether you are any good or not and the only decision you can make is that you did it.

Inspiration springs more readily from knowledge than from ignorance.

Not yet hardened, many young die good.

...and I have this stupid little thought that Aaron didn't survive the croc attack after all, that he died but he's so pissed off at me that dying didn't stop him from coming here to kill me anyway.

Not all friendships take a long time to grow and deepen. Some are formed in an instant.