A good story is always more dazzling than a broken piece of truth.

There is something about words. In expert hands, manipulated deftly, they take you prisoner.

But there can be no secrets in a house where there are children.

The funeral was over, at last I could cry. Except that I couldn't. My tears, kept in too long, had fossilized. They would have to stay in forever now.

What better way to get to know someone than through her choice and treatment of books?

There was no single moment when I thought, Aha! What a great idea! Rather there was a slow and gradual accumulation of numerous small ideas.

The tears I gratified him with were fake ones. Ones that set off my green eyes the way diamonds set off emeralds. And it worked. If you dazzled a man with green eyes, he will be so hypnotized that he won’t notice there is someone inside the eyes spying on him. – Vida Winters Page 268