She is too fond of books

and it has turned her brain.

[sheistoofondofbooks]

For I do love moons, they are so pretty and so romantic. I wish we had five or six; I would never go to bed; I should never get tired lying on the moss-bank and looking up at them.

Mark Twain, Eve's Diary

[sheistoofondofbooks]

It seemed to me at an early age that all human communication ... begins with someone wanting to tell a story. That need to tell, to plug into a universal socket, is probably one of our grandest desires. And the need to hear stories, to live lives other than our own for even the briefest moment, is the key to the magic that was born in our bones.

Robert R. McCammon, Boy's Life

[sheistoofondofbooks]

Maybe he was crazy. Maybe crazy is what they call anybody who's got magic in them after they're no longer a child.

Robert R. McCammon, Boy's Life

[sheistoofondofbooks]

"People under seventy and over seven are very unreliable if they are not cats. You can never be too careful."

Leonora Carrington, The Hearing Trumpet

[sheistoofondofbooks]

But be warned, young Nona: a book is as dangerous as any journey you might take. The person who closes the back cover might not be the same one that opened the front one. Treat books with respect.

Mark Lawrence, Red Sister

[sheistoofondofbooks]

"Everything just gets so fucked up sometimes and the natural resting state of reality is not to make any goddamned sense if it can help it and you've just got to accept that because it's not going to get any better from here on in."

-Catherynne Valente, Space Opera

[sheistoofondofbooks]

I simply ask you to see that there is only one thing to do when we fall, and that is to get up, and go on with the life that is set in front of us, and try to do the good of which our hands are capable for the people who come in our way.

March, Geraldine Brooks

[sheistoofondofbooks]

Love seems to me to be the most important thing of all. To thoroughly understand the world, to explain it, to despise it, may be the thing great thinkers do. But I'm only interested in being able to love the world, not to despise it, not to hate it and me, to be able to look upon it and me and all beings with love and admiration and great respect.

Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha

[sheistoofondofbooks]

Don't kill yourself. Even when the darkness is total. Always know that life is not still. Time is space. You are moving through that galaxy. Wait for the stars.

Matt Haig, The Humans

[sheistoofondofbooks]

You don't have to be an academic. You don't have to be anything. Don't force it. Feel your way, and don't stop feeling your way until something fits. Maybe nothing will. Maybe you are a road, not a destination. That is fine. Be a road. But make sure it's one with something to look at out of the window.

Matt Haig, The Humans

[sheistoofondofbooks]

I want to explain how exhausted I am. Even in my dreams. How I wake up tired. How I’m being drowned by some kind of black wave.

Elizabeth Wurtzel, Prozac Nation

[sheistoofondofbooks]

Sometimes, a book can take you on a journey far beyond the story itself. Sometimes, one thing leads to another and, six months later, you’re reading about the existence of telepathic bionic soldiers and someone asks you how this obsession came to be and you’re like, “My friend Kyle gave me The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell.” And they’re like, “What the?” And you’re like, “Seriously, shut up. I’m reading.” It’s the best kind of downward spiral.

Annie Spence, Dear Fahrenheit 451: A Librarian’s Love Letters and Break-up Notes to the Books in Her Life

[sheistoofondofbooks]

A long time ago I stopped wondering why there were so many crazy people. What surprises me now is that there are so many sane ones.

Rachel Khong, Goodbye Vitamin

[sheistoofondofbooks]

Children see God every day; they just don't call it that. It's the summer sky painted with cumulus clouds by day and sequined with a million stars by night. It's the sweet whispers of sweet gum trees and the sounds riding the tops of honeysuckle-scented breezes.

Charles M. Blow, Fire Shut Up in My Bones

[sheistoofondofbooks]

Why is 'What do you want to be when you grow up?' the go-to small talk we make with children? 'Hello, child. As I have run out of compliments to pay you on your doodling, can you tell me what sort of niche you plan to carve out for yourself in the howling existential morass of uncertainty known as the future? Also, has anyone given you a heads-up that everyone you love will die someday?'

Lindy West, Shrill

[sheistoofondofbooks]

We all have to lose our minds a little. We all have to follow our hearts blindly and we all have to walk through the fire no matter how bad it gets. That is how you will find the things you need to believe again. That is how you will find your way back home.

Robert M. Drake, "Lose It All"

[sheistoofondofbooks]

I'd like to believe that somewhere out there someone has done the right thing with you. I'd like to believe that someone has made you laugh in the middle of the night, that someone has left the sun in your pocket, in your hair, and in those little moments where you feel free. I'd like to believe that you are flying within yourself because there is a paradise in you. There is so much more. And I hope you are doing well, even if it is not with me.

Robert M. Drake, "A Bird Flew Through"