Home > Author > Xiran Jay Zhao
61 " When you cherish someone for how amazing they are, you don’t pluck them from their roots just to watch them wither in your hands. You help them bloom into the incredible thing they’re really meant to be. "
― Xiran Jay Zhao , Iron Widow (Iron Widow, #1)
62 " How many aspects of the piloting system - and the world in general - are based on sterile facts, and how many are just illusions? Illusions that reinforce themselves generation after generation, because people don't question the convenient boxes they're penned into, the arbitrary rules they live by? "
63 " In hindsight, I was such a fool to have assumed Qieluo would stand by me just because she’s also female.It was my grandmother who crushed my feet in half.It was my mother who encouraged me and Big Sister to offer ourselves up as concubines so our brother could afford a future bride.It was always the village aunties who’d sit around gossiping about which girl hadn’t been married off yet, despite complaining nonstop about their own husbands. And then they’d congratulate new mothers for being “blessed” to have a boy, despite being female themselves. "
64 " There's not a stratum of the world that doesn't need girls. Maybe we're devalued precisely because we're so valuable. The world is too afraid of not bein able to obtain and control us to respect our true worth. "
65 " I don't know if it's more sad or harrowing that she's been crushed into dust by marriage, yet is ecstatic to see the same hammer swing toward me. "
66 " Where does jealousy come from, if not an insecurity that I'll lose you because of him? But that's not how it works, no matter how many people believe it so. You're not something to be kept or taken, and love isn't some scarce resource to battle over. Love can be infinite , as much as your heart can open. I mean, when you think about it, love is fueled mostly by compatibility. Whether two people make each other happy by being close. So it'd be pointless of me to resent Shimin. However compatible you are with him, it doesn't have anything to do with how compatible you are with me. "
67 " The bloodlust in his eyes rouses something primal and deep-rooted inside me, something that finds it so…Utterly relatable. "
68 " Too bad. I am exactly the kind of ice-blooded, rotten-hearted girl he fears I am. And I am fine with that. May he stay unsettled. "
69 " Men want us so badly for our bodies, yet hate us so much for our minds. "
70 " One last thing," I say over my shoulder, too quiet for my family to hear over the hovercraft churning. "Don't think I've overlooked that you came to my house and almost foiled my plan, despite knowing how important it is to me. If you tip off the army in even the slightest way, I will kill myself when they lock me up, and then I will haunt you. "
71 " But there is money to be made in being hated this much, and being a source of money means power and protection. Media traffic doesn't care about right or wrong. Every click on a scandalous headline brings profit; every view of a condemning picture generates revenue. "
72 " It's hilarious. Men want us to badly for out bodies, yet hate us so much for our minds. "
73 " And how am I supposed to sign up for my death if my eyebrows are uneven? "
74 " When you cherish someone for how amazing they are, you don't pluck them from their roots just to watch them wither in your hands "
75 " Countless times, I watched my father turn my mother into a nervous wreck by simply transforming himself into a dark cloud of a presence. He wouldn’t use any curses or shouts, but he’d set his bowl down a little too loudly, or slam doors a little too harshly. She’d step cautiously around him as if he were a bomb, worrying about her every move for fear of setting him off. Without uttering a single word, he’d teach her to twist herself into knots to prioritize his needs and wants, in some strangling hope of quelling the pressure in the house and returning things to normal. "
76 " I’ve been told endless lies since I was born. That I was not kind enough, considerate enough, humble enough, honorable enough, pretty enough, pleasing enough. And that if I failed to meet the needs of those around me, I did not deserve to live. "
77 " I think... you've been lied to about what male needs are like. We aren't animals. Yes, our desires get pretty strong, but they're not overpowering. There's no such thing as going mad because of them."A bitter laugh grinds out of me like glass shards. "Tell that to all the girls getting raped as we speak.""That's not a matter of losing control. Every guy who does something like that knows exactly what he's doing. There is always a moment where he consciously decides that he will ruin sometone's life to feel better about his own. Always. "
78 " I drag my nails down my head and scream. "
79 " Redemption story, they said?There will be no redemption. It is no me who is wrong. It's everyone else. "
80 " So what am I supposed to do?''Your worst, of course.' She smiles. "