Quotes from books, part VII

After a long hiatus (in my drafts folder), we return to the “quotes from books” series. This batch includes quotes from books I read between August 2016 and April 2017.

Shrill by Lindy West was so excellent I have three quotes from it: (a) “I was working at a cashier at an “upscale general store and gift shop” (or, as it was known around my house, the Bourgeois Splendor Ceramic Bird Emporium & Money Fire)…”; (b) “Shame is a tool of oppression, not change….You know what’s shameful? A complete lack of empathy”; (c) “Just because you haven’t personally experienced something doesn’t make it not true.”
I re-read a longtime favorite, Barbara Kingsolver’s Pigs in Heaven, which is full of beautiful language, and this line is as true as ever: “It occurs to her that there is one thing about people you can never understand well enough: how entirely inside themselves they are.”
From David Levithan’s story “Your Temporary Santa” in My True Love Gave to Me, : “And in that moment, in that momentary loss of logic to wonder…”
From Leigh Bardugo’s “Head, Scales, Tongue, Tail” in Summer Days and Summer Nights: “Some of us wear our hearts. Some of us carry them.”
“None are so blind as those who will not see.” –The Wonder, Emma Donoghue
“If underneath anger was fear, then underneath fear was love. Everything came down to the terror of losing what you love.” –Today Will Be Different, Maria Semple
“The past was never perfect, and we never reach the future.” –Moranifesto, Caitlin Moran
“If there’s a word for something, we’re much more likely to ‘see’ it and treat it as real.” –Waking Up White, Debby Irving
“I tell her: Maybe if you take off all that armor, you won’t feel so heavy.” –Still Life With Tornado, A.S. King
“There is one kind of thought that’s always useful and always gracious. That kind of thought is, “What can I do for someone else?”” –Gracious, Kelly Williams Brown