Home > Work > A Great and Terrible Beauty (Gemma Doyle, #1)
81 " ...We're never prepared for how much we love our children, for how much we wish we could protect them by being perfect. "
― Libba Bray , A Great and Terrible Beauty (Gemma Doyle, #1)
82 " They see her differently now, as somebody. And isn't that what everyone wants? To be seen? "
83 " You have been deceived. Spiritualism is no more a science than thievery. For that's all this is--very skilled dodgers stealing money from the bereaved for a little glint of hope. People see what they want to see when they need to. "
84 " Felicity laughs and takes on the tone of a fashionable lady. "Darling, the Bryn-Joneses have just done the most marvelous thing in their parlor with human blood. We simply must have ours done straightaway! "
85 " I'm whining. It's unattractive, but I find I'm powerless to stop "
86 " It's just a little initiation we have here at Spence - we like to torture each other. Beauty, grace, and charm my foot. It's a school for sadists with good tea-serving skills. "
87 " He deserves to have his head on a spike for all to see. Waring: If you are insufferable, do not walk here. We shall eat you down to the marrow. "
88 " But without that spark of anger, without destruction, there can be no rebirth. "
89 " Dans chaque fin, il y a un début. "
90 " I don't trust her father than I can run full-steam in a corset. "
91 " Even Felicity can't keep from sputtering with laughter. I wish I could use my evil eye. Or at least my evil boot right smack against Cecily’s backside. "
92 " We’re all looking glasses, we girls, existing only to reflect their images back to them as they’d like to be seen. "
93 " God save me from a woman's tears, for I've no strength against them. "
94 " Right now, with that lock of hair falling in his eyes, he's the brother I've missed, the one who once brought me stones from the sea, told me they were rajah's jewels. I want to tell him that I'm afraid I'm going mad by degrees and that nothing seems entirely real to me anymore. I want to tell him about the vision, have him pat me on the head in that irritating way and dismiss it with a perfectly logical doctor's explaination. I want to ask him if it's possible that a girl can be born unlovable, or does she just become that way? I want to tell him everything and have him understand. "
95 " Are you saying we're not ravish-worthy? "
96 " I don't want to have this conversation. It's sunny out. There's bacon downstairs. "
97 " Yes, fine," I say, feeling dead inside. They don't know what they're in for at Spence, getting me, a ghost of a girl who'll nod and smile and take her tea who isn't really here. "
98 " But forgiveness...I'll hold on to that fragile slice of hope and keep it close, remembering that in each of us lie good and bad, light and dark, art and pain, choice and regret, cruelty and sacrifice. "
99 " Your mind is not a cage. It’s a garden. And it requires cultivating. "
100 " I can't help feeling humiliated for Ithal. He stands at the wall and watches us go, and when we reach the turnoff for the school, he's still there with the mangled flower in his hands, far behind us a small, dying star fading out of our constellation. "