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Metamorphosis is the most profound of all acts.

Catherynne M. Valente

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Catherynne M. Valente
Age: 45
Born: 1979
Born: May 5
Literary Critic
Novelist
Poet
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Seattle
Washington
Cat Valente
Metamorphosis
Acts
Profound

More quotes by Catherynne M. Valente

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I’m a monster,” said the shadow of the Marquess suddenly. “Everyone says so.” The Minotaur glanced up at her. “So are we all, dear,” said the Minotaur kindly. “The thing to decide is what kind of monster to be. The kind who builds towns or the kind who breaks them.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Never put your faith in a Prince. When you require a miracle, trust in a Witch.
Catherynne M. Valente
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It is harder, usually, to find a person who wants to walk the streets of me, to taste the teas of my country, to... immigrate, you could say.
Catherynne M. Valente
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That’s what a map is, you know. Just a memory.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Hats have power. Hats can change you into someone else.
Catherynne M. Valente
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However wretched her origins, she chose freely to continue her crimes against us from the moment she woke to this life. It is easy to forgive beautiful women, especially when they lay a sorrowful tale before you like a sugar-dusted meal. It does not mean they deserve forgiveness.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Death stands behind every bride, every groom.
Catherynne M. Valente
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When I saw him I thought I could curl up inside him and go to sleep and never wake up. Men are no good for that, Masha. They'll always want you working, when you're not softening their fall into bed at the end of the day.
Catherynne M. Valente
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First, the avid student must be aware that when the world was young it knew only seven things: water, life and death, salt, night, birds and the length of an hour.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Her father’s shadow looked sadly down at her. “You can never forget what you do in a war, September my love. No one can. You won’t forget your war either.
Catherynne M. Valente
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The future is a messy, motley business, little girl.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Marya pinned out her childhood like a butterfly. She considered it the way a mathematician considers an equation.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Never trust anyone under one hundred!
Catherynne M. Valente
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Husbands lie, Masha. I should know I've eaten my share. That's lesson one. Lesson number two: among the topics about which a husband is most likely to lie are money, drink, black eyes, political affiliation, and women who squatted on his lap before and after your sweet self.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Temperament, you'll find, is highly dependent on time of day, weather, frequency of naps, and whether one has had enough to eat.
Catherynne M. Valente
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She did not want to read this book from start to finish, or rather, she thought perhaps it did not want her to. Instead she practiced the art of bibliomancy, trusting the book to show her what it wanted her to know.
Catherynne M. Valente
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It is such hard work to keep your heart hidden! And worse, by the time you find it easy, it will be harder still to show it. It is a terrible magic in this world to ask for exactly the thing you want. Not least because to know exactly the thing you want and look it in the eye is a long, long labor.
Catherynne M. Valente
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Someone ought to write a novel about me,” said Lebedeva loftily. “I shouldn’t care if they lied to make it more interesting, as long as they were good lies, full of kisses and daring escapes and the occasional act of barbarism. I can’t abide a poor liar.
Catherynne M. Valente
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... relationships required such vigilance, such attention. You had to hold them together by force of will, and other people took up so much space, demanded so much time. It was exhausting.
Catherynne M. Valente
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We all live inside the terrible engine of authority, and it grinds and shrieks and burns so that no one will say: lines on maps are silly.
Catherynne M. Valente