Mary E. Pearson

“Their voices meld into a cloudy rumble of their own, and I ponder Mira's and Aidan's secrets and imagine the injustice that threads through other lives, injustice that has no face because it is hidden away in a dark, shameful place, hidden for years in hopes of making it untrue.”

“My memory is coming back. It is curious how it comes. Each day, a rush of pieces, loosely connected, unimportant bits, snake through me. They click, click, click into my brain, like links being snapped together. And then they are done. A small chain of memories that fill in one tiny part of my life. They come out of nowhere, and most are not important.”

“Until one comes who is mightier,The one sprung from misery,The one who was weak,The one who was hunted,The one marked with claw and vine,The one named in secret,The one called Jezelia.”

“Words, Kaden. Only lost unsaid words that added up to good-bye.”

“I saw sadness when I looked at what was left of them. The demigods who had once controlled the heavens had been brought low, humbled to the point of death. I always imagined I heart their crumbled masterpieces singing an endless mourning dirge. I turned, looking at the wild grass shivering across the plateau. "I see only reminders that nothing lasts forever, not even greatness.""Some things last."I faced him. "Really? And just what would that be?""The things that matter.”

“Teens affect history. They affect lives; they affect our cultural growth and change, and yet, and at the same time, they are often the most vulnerable among us.”

“It's the unknown that I fear, the bites of memories that still have no connections.”

“Poetry?"..."No, just thoughts, glimpses, things running through my head.”

“Pieces. A bit for someone here. A bit there. And sometimes they don't add up to anything whole. But you are so busy dancing. Delivering. You don't have time to notice. Or are afraid to notice. And then one day you have to look. And it's true. All of your pieces fill up other people's holes. But they don't fill your own.”

“I created an icicle sculpture in the snow. White on white.”

“The world before us is a postcard, and I imagine the story we are writing on it.”

“Ascente cha ores ri ve breazza.""Turn your ear to the wind," she interpreted. "Stand strong.”

“Snow. I wondered what it felt like. Aunt Bernette said it could be both soft and hard, cold and hot. It stung and burned when the wind pelted it through the air, and it was a gentle cold feather when it drifted down in lazy circles from the sky. I couldn't imagine it being so many things, and I wondered if she had taken license with her story as Father always claimed. I couldn't stop thinking of it.Snow.”

“ChoiceI needed it like I needed air.Bit no one could hear me. No one could listen. No words. No sound.No voice.I couldn't even dream myself away.Choices were made.None of them mine.At first I wondered if it was hell.And then I knew it was.”

“Fifty years in the future, I should hope we'll be on our second woman president, at least.”

“The seed of the gift may come, but a seedling that isn't nourished dies quickly.”

“Today was the day a thousand dreams would die and a single dream would be born.The wind knew. It was the first of June, but cold gusts bit at the hilltop citadelle as fiercely as deepest winter, shaking the windows with curses and winding through drafty halls with warning whispers. There was no escaping what was to come.”

“Percentages! Those are for economists, polls, and politicians. Percentages can't define your identity.”

“A perfect night... a perfect forever”

“Faith and science, I have learned, are two sides of the same coin, separated by an expanse so small, but wide enough that one side can't see the other. They don't even know they're connected. Father and Lily were two sides of the same coin, I've decided, and maybe I am the space in between.”