Catherynne M. Valente Quotes
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All hands drowned, except the Red Hound of Mykenos, who bit the sea until it spit him back.
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September waited. She long ago learned that if she waited and blinked and behaved like a pupil, eventually someone would lecture her on something.
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All Librarians are Secret Masters of Severe Magic. Goes with the territory.
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Perhaps all a Tsaritsa is is a beautiful cold girl in the snow, looking down at someone wretched, and not yielding.
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And as we watched, the Tsar of Death lifted up his eyelids like skirts and began to dance in the streets of Leningrad.
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How else are you supposed to deal with people who like terrible things? Hit them with a shovel till they stop, that’s how.
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She always gave the impression of having accidentally wandered in from a mad scientist’s conference, and felt rather desperate to get back.
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She is so stubborn, her heart has an argument with her head every time it wants to beat.
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Chicago at the time owned a lake the size of a sea, several advertising firms, at least six tribes of marauding criminals, healthy herds of sailors grazing free, the first Ferris wheel in all the world, and more wind than it could care for.
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And if they thought her aimless, if they thought her a bit mad, let them. It meant they left her alone. Marya was not aimless, anyway. She was thinking.
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…but she does not know whom she wishes to catch, only that she wishes to catch someone, anyone, to be anchored, to be connected, to not be abandoned.
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Didn't you know? All stepmothers are witches. It is our compensation for remaining forever an intruder in another woman's house.
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Oh, come on, you must know ‘Leave It Black.’ I see a black door and I’m extremely satisfied with how it looks?
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Tell it fast before you get scared and silence yourself. You’ll never wish you’d held back a little more.
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If the world is divided into seeing and not seeing, Marya thought, I shall always choose to see.
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It's easier to use somebody if you can think of them as mute and dumb and made for your pleasure.
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Now, in the Kingdom of School, to be asked into another child's room is like being asked inside their heart.
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Perhaps my philosophy is not so sophisticated. It goes: Come inside. I love you. A Whelk's love will grow as big as it's allowed.
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I belong in the refrigerator. Because the truth is, I'm just food for a superhero. He'll eat up my death and get the energy he needs to become a legend.
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But we had young turnips and mustard greens in our befuddled stomach that day, and these things make bravery.
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It’s a funny thing. You go your whole life thinking you’re the protagonist, but really, you’re just backstory.
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But I’ve brought you to the snow, and the snow is the beginning and the end of everything, everyone knows that.
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Falling in love is embarrassing. It is not hardcore. It is not part of the scene.
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Your past’s a private matter, sweetheart. You just keep it locked up in a box where it can’t hurt anyone.