He looks at me, and I don't know what he sees. I used to think it was Rose. But she's not here with us now, in this room. It's just him and me, and the books. I feel like our lives are in those books. I feel like all the words on the pages are for us.

For males twenty-five is the fatal age. For women it's twenty. We are all dropping like flies.

Before I can process what’s happening, Deirdre has opened her hands and Linden has taken the ring from her and slipped it onto my finger. “Rhine Ashby,” he says. “My wife.

Write words you’re willing to burn at the stake for. Write words you’d believe in even if the rest of the world didn’t.

There are so many of us, so many girls. The world wants us for our wombs or our bodies, or it doesn't want us at all.

She's been conned, ruined, left for dead, and she's not going to forgive any of it. She will soldier on, if only out of spite.

Tell freedom I said hello.' 'If I happen to see it, I will.