Quotes from Alice Hoffman

He had felt the same sort of aloneness once again when Maria told him to leave;

thought if I ever fell in love, I would want my beloved to wish what I had come to wish, that the book had ended differently, so that the first Mrs. Rochester might have made her escape.

A RED MAP ISN'T EASY TO FOLLOW. ANY DOCUMENT MADE of blood and bones is tricky. Wrong turns are easily made, and there are often piles of stones in the road. A person has to disregard time and sorrow and all the damage done.

If sparrows were meant to fly, and hawks to hunt, and greyhounds to run, then a boy such as Diamond was meant to search for his mother. If he didn't go, if he forgot or thought of himself first, then he wouldn't be Diamond.

Knowledge was the way of our people, and knowledge was dangerous. It

We don't need to make a living off of other people's pain...the newspapers want violence, retribution, crime, sin.

her soul was in her mouth, ready to escape as a puff of air

Remember one thing," Hannah told Maria. "Always love someone who will love you back.

His song would be our only path, despite any sins w might have committed and any punishments we might deserve. What we believed in, and what we said aloud, we could create before His eyes and in His image.

He couldn't help but wonder if Moses Levy had experienced this same heat, if true images burned their maker. He wondered, too, if the hermit at that riverside was right, if there wasn't some element of capturing a soul in each photograph, if he wasn't responsible for those whose images he caught.

Elizabeth is suddenly reminded that she can walk down that road anytime she wants to. There are better things to be afraid of than a country road bordered with scrub pine and oaks.

Shelby loves Maravelle; she wishes she could spend the night in Valley Stream, but being with Maravelle and her mother would only make her sadder. She doesn't have a mother anymore. There's no one to whom she's the most important person in the world.

We all burn for what is bad for us...burn him in return. Maybe then the bastard won't have such a hold over you.

I wasn't good company, that was true, and people avoided me, but that was alright.

She's reminded of the time when she would get lost on purpose and her mother would look for her, shouting her name as though calling for a lost dog. Now she burns with regret when she thinks that she hid from her own mother. She should have leapt up and waved her arms. She should have gotten into her mom's car and said, Thank you for rescuing me.

She liked soot, and heat, and grime, and she was beginning to realize, if she didn't actually like her aloneness, she was at least comforted by it. She should be grateful; she knew, she knew. She should be thrilled just to be alive. So why was it she preferred to expect nothing?

But desire can drive you for miles. It can lead you in ways you never would have imagined. A map can be written in ashes, earth, water, air. Take a step and keep walking. Don't be afraid to look back. In the end, every path you choose takes you closer to what you've been searching for all along.

being young will slip through your hands and you will be left standing there, you who were once so young, not recognizing yourself or your life. "I'd like a mirror

She didn't thank Ben, and she probably should have, but maybe he knows that she's grateful. Maybe he understands that saying thank you can be just as hard as saying good-bye.

Helene had an upstairs bedroom all to herself. I'm the favorite, she told Shelby, who marveled at her confidence, even back then. Shelby was an only child and she didn't feel like the favorite, not until her mother was dying. I never want to stop watching over you, Shelby's mother had told her, and then she wondered why it had taken her so long to know she was loved.

Nobody ever thinks it will happen," Sarah replied. "Real life is unbelievable. Souls are snatched away from us, flesh and blood turn to dust, people you love betray you, men go to war over nothing. It's all preposterous. That's why we have novels. To make sense of things.

Some people believe that if you don't open your eyes to sorrow and you don't talk about it, you can pretend it never happened.

We mourned in silence so that we would not curse the world we walked through. I saw owls in the locust trees and wondered if these creatures were the spirits of the dead, for there were so many murdered in our homeland there was not room enough for all of their ghosts. I half-believed they had turned into birds instead.

Despite the curse, despite the losses you might endure, she knew now that love was the only thing that lasted. It was inside you and with you for all eternity.