FastSaying

It is well known that reading quickens the growth of a heart like nothing else.


Catherynne M. Valente

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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Nothing strengthens the judgement and quickens the conscience like individual responsibility.
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Blue is for cruel bargains; green is for daring what you oughtn’t; violet is for brute force. I wi...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE We are halves, but we make an infinite whole.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I’m a monster,” said the shadow of the Marquess suddenly. “Everyone says so.”

Th...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE 1. Santa Claus is real. However, your parents are folkloric constructs meant to protect and foritfy ...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE We all live inside the terrible engine of authority, and it grinds and shrieks and burns so that no ...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I'm not lost, because I haven't any idea where to go that I might get lost on the way to. I'd lik...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Children make prayers so thoughtlessly, building them up like sand castles—and they are always sur...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Many people in this room have an Etsy store where they create unique, unreplicable artifacts or usef...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Because I’m a cat. A big one, the Panther of Rough Storms, in fact. But still a cat. If there’s ...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE But this is a story,
and in a story
there is always someone
beautiful enough."
<...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Why do you need that thing?" September asked. "None of the airports back home have them."
"They...
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If you are a monster, a trickster, a fiend,
If you’ve bu...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Metamorphosis is the most profound of all acts.
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I am certainly intrepid and splendid and sordid and strong; I can see why you'd want me! But I'm afr...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE You only had to choose which me to talk to, for, you know, we all change our manners, depending on w...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Her heart was bruised by the kiss, smashed and surprised and unsettled by it. September thought kiss...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE One: A Library Is the Size of the Universe and the Universe Is the Size of a Library. Two: Everyone ...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Do you suppose you will look the same when you are an old woman as you do now? Most folk have three ...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Oh, September! It is so soon for you to lose your friends to good work and strange loves and high am...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I have missed you so much I could kiss you,” he whispered.

September’s face fell. “...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE She must protect herself. There would be no one to do it for her. A plan started to prick up its ear...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Shows what you know, sunny-girl! I’m sure you’ve heard people talk about their Heart’s Desire�...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE That's Venus, September thought. She was the goddess of love. It's nice that love comes on first thi...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE September had never been betrayed before. She did not even know what to call the feeling in her ches...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE A library is never complete. That’s the joy of it. We are always seeking one more book to add to o...
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE For there are two kinds of forgiveness in the world: the one you practice because everything really ...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE A book is a door, you know. Always and forever. A book is a door into another place and another hear...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Just tell yourself a story that'll satisfy you and pretend he told it.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE The keeping of lists was for November an exercise kin to repeating of a rosary. She considered it ne...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Do not ruin today with mourning tomorrow.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Who told you you couldn't come back when you're grown? Was it the same person who told you grown-ups...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I wonder sometimes what the memory of God looks like. Is it a palace of infinite rooms, a chest of m...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE That's how you get deathless, volchitsa. Walk the same tale over and over, until you wear a groove i...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Thieves are not so bad, and killing wears all possible costumes. There is no death, no murder that i...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE

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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Recite the Periodic Table of Teatime, in correct order, with Elemental Symbols, please.'
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CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE He tried to reconstruct the story in his mind, but it kept getting confused, bleeding into itself li...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Then he is a monster!" the Prince crowed, "and I must slay him at once. The Formula works!"
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Well enough. I won't ask you if your love is true or any of that rot—it's not my place to judge. A...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE ...her cry is a hook and it catches me in the throat.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE You think I am so wicked, don't you? A monster. Unnatural. How cruel of me to keep you here and ratt...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I perceive that you have a cruel heart, my child. It lies within your breast like a smoldering blade...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE However wretched her origins, she chose freely to continue her crimes against us from the moment she...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE You know how we can be about things which sparkle and shine. We imagine they will put back something...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Yes, yes, mistress, I shall go and accomplish your task. Only—I was not only sent to kill the Leuc...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Stories,' the green-eyed Sigrid said, unperturbed, 'are like prayers. It does not matter when you be...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE She was beautiful and terrifying, savage and pure.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE You wanted Death? This is it. Dirt and decay, nothing more. Death translates us all into earth.” H...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE It is best in the end to let women see to their own vengeance.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Maidens stand still, they are lovely statues and all admire them. Witches do not stand still. I was ...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I am a Prince," he replied, being rather dense. "It is the function of a Prince—value A—to kill ...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE We all have someone we think shines so much more than we do that we are not even a moon to their sun...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE She is so stubborn, her heart has an argument with her head every time it wants to beat.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Here’s something I bet you don’t know:
every time someone writes a story about a dragon CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE From that day forward she never used my name. Eventually I forgot it. Mrs. H called me something new...
CATHERYNNE M VALENTE Your Eve was wise, John. She knew that Paradise would make her mad, if she were to live forever with...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE He didn't even know how to talk about it. He had practiced not talking about the things he knew unti...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I got a heart like a half bottle of no-label whiskey.
Nothing to brag on,
but enough for y...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE No one belongs when they are new to this world. All children are Changelings.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Readers will always insist on adventures, and though you can have grief without adventures, you cann...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Everyone has a right to cry uncle on a genre every once in awhile. I've done it myself. Sometime...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Every writing teacher I ever had except for one told me I was an awful writer, had no idea what I wa...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I have always been delighted when told there was a piece of fanfic inspired by a book of mine floati...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I try to hurt myself, to sprain something, writing every novel and story, because I'm stretching...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Fantasy is my heart and love. And I just want to play in that garden for the rest of my life.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Every morning is a battle between the superego and the id, and I am a mere foot soldier with mud and...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Monsters almost always are culture's way of working out their fears and are thus inherently incr...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Vampires should be pretty much like mean girls, all the time, only amazing at it. Flawless. They'...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE For most of us, fanfiction is a non-issue. Even for midlist writers. We will never be popular enough...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I savor bitterness - it is born of experience. It is the privilege of one who has truly lived.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE PERCIVAL: Now, who is telling the story?
SEVERIN: The camera is telling the story. It's watchin...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Night poured itself down my throat. Night was my wine and my meat. Night wed me and bedded me, widow...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I have all the books I could need, and what more could I need than books?
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Don't be superior. Everyone drinks blood. Blood is a word that means alive. You can do without almos...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I see you go bare-shod. This is most likely extremely sensible. Shoes are no end of trouble for girl...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I am not a toy, September! Fairyland cannot just cast me aside when it’s finished playing with me!...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE Listen to me. Love is a Yeti. It is bigger than you and frightening and terrible. It makes loud and ...
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE I was better than a punk. I was a protaganist.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE IN THE REFRIGERATOR MONOLOGUES Why not say it? I'm bursting out of my cocoon. It was all too nice in the past - it never knocked an...
BENITA VALENTE Inside I have been a stabber, a screamer, a die-er from way back.
BENITA VALENTE Young singers ask me, "Do I have to live in New York?" I say, "You can live wherever you want-as lon...
BENITA VALENTE We're Kansas and the other side is Oz. People think no one lives here. But this is a really active n...
LYNN VALENTE I want to come out of my house and see kids and people enjoying themselves. I grew up in the Marina....
LYNN VALENTE We want a vibrant neighborhood. We want to activate this big, scary empty space.
LYNN VALENTE That's part of farming; you just have to deal with what you have. Every year is different.
JOE VALENTE He asked to borrow my (cell) phone. When he handed it back, it was full of blood.
JOE VALENTE I am a diamond
But people see me as gold
Honestly, I wanna be silver
M -I would die for you
-You lie
-If I lie, why do I stand here before and beg on my knees t...
M Morals; the pathetic answer to authority
Seen two gorillas sharing a banana?
M. COCHET M. I'm not a leftist; I'm where the righteous ought to be.
M. M. COADY I believe in working with songs that have personal value for me.
M. WARD It's no fun for me to cover a song and produce it the exact same way as it already exists. When ...
M. WARD I'm somebody who gets a lot of inspiration from dreams.
M. WARD When you work on a record for three years, it's a great sense of relief when it is finally out i...
M. WARD I wouldn't want to cover a Hank Williams song in a country-western way. It doesn't occur to ...
M. WARD I love the sound of Elmore James, the sound early guitarists like him got just by using minimal mean...
M. WARD I get most of my inspiration from older records and older production styles, and that ends up rearin...
M. WARD I do watch 'American Idol' sometimes. It's not really that pleasurable... I take that ba...
M. WARD I don't really watch TV series because I don't want to get hooked on them and have them suck...
M. WARD The South of France is one of my favorite places in the world.
M. WARD I've worked with just as many talented women as I have talented men, and I feel fortunate enough...
M. WARD I always prefer other people's interpretations over my own, so I'm not very quick to make ex...
M. WARD I definitely don't see myself as much of a singer, because my upbringing is really based around ...
M. WARD I get most of my inspiration from older records. Most of the records that I listen to were probably ...
M. WARD It's a luxury to not have to just be performing with other people to have my music heard.
M. WARD Certain things you have to stumble on to. They can't be preprogrammed.
M. WARD I love the idea that I planned my career. I did not. It started out by getting invitations from arti...
M. WARD I don't like the way recording to digital sounds. Most of the time, when I'm recording to tw...
M. WARD