The logic: Reading is a private pursuit, one that often takes place behind closed doors. A young lady might retreat with a book, might even take it into her boudoir, and there, reclining on here silken sheets, imbibing the thrills and chills manufactured by writerly quills, one of her hands, one not absolutely needed to grip the little volume, might wander. The fear, in short, as one-handed reading. [p. 146]

We chart delusions through collective agreement.

Writing fiction is like remembering what never happened.

Pain is always emotional. Fear and depression keep constant company with chronic hurting.

Reading is perception as translation. The inert signs of an alphabet become living meanings in the mind.

Many writers over the centuries simply do not have the reputations they deserve because they were female, and that is an act of suppression.

I will turn human anatomy into roses and stars and sea. I will dissect the beloveds body in metaphor.