Sarah Addison Allen Quotes - Page 2

You can't change where you came from, but you can change where you go from here.

There was a strange but universal understanding among women. On some level all women knew, they all understood, the fear of being outnumbered, of being helpless. It throbbed in their chests when they thought about the times they left stores and were followed. The knocks on their car windows as they were sitting alone at red lights, and strangers asking for rides. Having too much to drink and losing their ability to be forceful enough to just say no. Smiling at strange men coming on to them, not wanting to hurt their feelings, not wanting to make a scene. All women remembered these things, even if they had never happened to them personally. It was a part of their collective unconscious.

He stared up at the moon, which looked like a giant hole in the sky, letting light through to the other side.

You can't change where you come from, but you can change where you go from here. Just like a book. If you don't like the ending, you can make up a new one.

She looked like autumn, when leaves turned and fruit ripened.

Bay remembered the Waverley house full of pumpkin pie scents in the fall. There had been mountains of maple cakes with violets hidden inside, lakes of butternut soups with chrysanthemum petals floating on top.

We're connected, as women. It's like a spiderweb. If one part of that web vibrates, if there's trouble, we all know it, but most of the time we're just too scared, or selfish, or insecure to help. But if we don't help each other, who will?

Warm, enticing scents were floating down, basil and oregano and tomato. It made Wes long for something, something he couldn't place. A happy childhood, a home.

But that would leave Paxton to fend for herself, and the last thing any woman wanted in this kind of situation was to look around and see all the people who could help her doing nothing.

He stood there, glowing like the sun, and stared at her like she was the unbelievable one.

There was an art to the male posterior. That's all there was to it.

Adolescence is like having only enough light to see the step directly in front of you.

You can't change where you came from, but you can change where you go from here. Just like a book. If you don't like the ending, you make up a new one.

He hadn't meant to get so angry at Morgan. He didn't often get angry at other people. There was no sense in it. The person you were angry at was rarely ever repentant. Now, getting angry with yourself had some merit. It showed you had sense enough to chastise the one person who had any hope of benefiting from it. And he was plenty angry with himself. For many things.

...everyone knows that road, the one leading out of town into a deep green expanse of pastures and old farmhouses, which at first makes it seem like you're entering a fairy tale, something sweet and old fashioned and lost in time. But, like all fairy tales, the beginning is always beautiful, a ruse to draw you into something you aren't anticipating.

Did you get rid of that sweater like I asked?""Yes, Mother," Josey said."I wasn't trying to be mean the other day. It just doesn't look good on you.""Yes, Mother," Josey said.The truth was, that sweater, that color, looked good on her daughter. And every time she wore it, it hinted at something that scared Margaret.Josey was growing into her beauty.Margaret watched Josey leave.She used to be a beautiful woman, the most beautiful woman around.She brought out the photo again.But that was forever ago.

Don't be vain. What you look like doesn't matter. It's the deed that matters.

People always say life is too short for regrets. But the truth is, it's too long.

Motherhood is hard enough without judgement from others who don't know the whole story.

Jack thought anyone who read couldn't be all that bad.

It was a remarkable realization to Eby, that we are what we're taught. That was why the Morris women were what they were. It was because they knew no different.

The outside world might have finally turned into autumn, but inside the Waverley house it still smelled of summer. It was lemon verbena day, so the house was filled with a sweet-tart that conjured images of picnic blankets and white clouds like true-love hearts.

It was like the way you wanted sunshine on Saturdays, or pancakes for breakfast. They just made you feel good.

Once he'd asked, "Don't you want to read? There are hundreds of books in the sitting room."She had laughed and said, "I've read them all. I want to remember them the way they were. If I read them now, the endings will have changed.

There was a sense of tightness in the room now, filling the space. Attraction was like that. It filled. It poured into you like batter into a pan, sticking to the sides.

Some of Bay's fondest memories were of lying under the apple tree in the summer while Claire gardened and the apple tree tossed apples at her like a dog trying to coax its owner into playing catch.

Yellow joy was radiating from her. When you're happy for yourself, it fills you. When you're happy for someone else, it pours over. It was almost too bright to watch.

She did know that it's remarkably easy to fall in love with someone who is already in love with you. It's a little like falling in love with yourself.

Her hair was longer than it used to be, and it veiled her shoulders like a shawl. She used it for protection. If there was one thing Sydney knew, it was hair. She loved beauty school and loved working in the salon in Boise. Hair said more about people than they knew, and Sydney understood the language naturally.

Love always hurts. That’s one thing I know you know. But it’s worth it. That’s what you don’t know. Yet.

Those silly girls had no idea what they were really celebrating. They had no idea what it took to bring Agatha and her friends together seventy-five years ago. The Women's Society Club had been about supporting one another, about banding together to protect one another because no one else would. But it had turned into an ugly beast, a means by which rich ladies would congratulate themselves by giving money to the poor. And Agatha had let it happen. All her life, it seemed, she was making up for things she let happen.

If a man has so much heat he burns your skin when he touches you, he's the devil. Run away

Like magic, she felt him getting nearer, felt it like a pull in the pit of her stomach. It felt like hunger but deeper, heavier. Like the best kind of expectation. Ice cream expectation. Chocolate expectation.

I know he's a good baby... but the challenge is to raise him into a good boy, then a good man.

It had always fascinated him that she'd consumed so many words, that her head was full of stories, told a thousand different ways.

On the day the tree bloomed in the fall, when its white apple blossoms fell and covered the ground like snow, it was tradition for the Waverleys to gather in the garden like survivors of some great catastrophe, hugging one another, laughing as they touched faces and arms, making sure they were all okay, grateful to have gotten through it.