Joanna Russ Quotes

Science fiction, as I mentioned before, writes about what is neither impossible nor possible; the fact is that, when the question of possibility comes up in science fiction, the author can only reply that nobody knows. We haven't been there yet. We haven't discovered that yet. Science fiction hasn't happened. ~ Joanna Russ

The Winter solstice (you haven't lived if you haven't seen us running around in our skivvies, banging on pots and pans, shouting "Come back, sun! Goddammit, come back! Come back! ~ Joanna Russ

I know you're competent and your thesis advisor knows you're competent. The question in our minds is are you really serious about what you're doing?"

This was said to a young woman who had already spent five years and over $10,000 getting to that point in her Ph.D. program. ~ Joanna Russ

Chastity is not given once and for all like a wedding ring that is put on never to be taken off, but is a garden which each day must be weeded, watered, and trimmed anew, or soon there will be only brambles and wilderness. ~ Joanna Russ

I didn't and don't want to be a 'feminine' version or a diluted version or a special version or a subsidiary version or an ancillary version, or an adapted version of the heroes I admire. I want to be the heroes themselves. ~ Joanna Russ

The reply to this was that Three took out a small revolver, and this surprised me; for everyone knows that anger is most intense towards those you know: it is lovers and neighbors who kill each other. There's no sense, after all, in behaving that way toward a perfect stranger; where's the satisfaction? No love, no need; no need, no frustration; no frustration, no hate, right? It must have been fear. ~ Joanna Russ

Privileged groups, like everyone else, want to think well of themselves and to believe that they are acting generously and justly. ~ Joanna Russ

I tried once, you know, went to a dance all dressed up, but I felt like such a fool. Everyone kept making encouraging remarks about my looks as if they were afraid I'd cross back over the line again; I was trying, you know, I was proving their way of life was right, and they were terrified I'd stop. ~ Joanna Russ

In my opinion, questions that are based on something real ought to be settled by something real without all this damned lazy miserable drifting ~ Joanna Russ

If you want me to do something else useful, you had better show me what that something else is. ~ Joanna Russ

Now having Brynhildic fantasies about her was nothing
I have all sorts of extraordinary fantasies which I don't take seriously
but bringing my fantasies into the real world frightened me very much. It's not that they were bad in themselves, but they were Unreal and therefore culpable; to try to make Real what was Unreal was to mistake the very nature of things; it was a sin not against conscience (which remained genuinely indifferent during the whole affair) but against Reality, and of the two the latter is far more blasphemous. It's the crime of creating one's own Reality, of "preferring oneself" as a good friend of mine says. ~ Joanna Russ

Courage is willful hope. ~ Joanna Russ

When one culture has the big guns and the other has none, there is a certain predictablity about the outcome. ~ Joanna Russ

He's beginning to like me. I am a better and better audience as I get numbed, and although I've played this game of Impress You (and won it, too--though I don't like either of the prizes; winning is too much like losing) I'm too tired to go on playing tonight. ~ Joanna Russ

The trouble with men is that they have limited minds. That's the trouble
with women, too."
["Existence" (1975)] ~ Joanna Russ

I cannot get into this swamp or I will never get out; and if I start crying again I'll remember that I have no one to love, and if anyone treats me like that again, I'll kill him. Only I mustn't because they'll punish me. ~ Joanna Russ

When the memory of one's predecessors is buried, the assumption persists that there were none and each generation of women believes itself to be faced with the burden of doing everything for the first time. And if no one ever did it beforewhy do we think we can succeed now? ~ Joanna Russ

There is the vanity training, the obedience training, the self-effacement training, the deference training, the dependency training, the passivity training, the rivalry training, the stupidity training, the placation training. How am I to put this together with my human life, my intellectual life, my solitude, my transcendence, my brains, and my fearful, fearful ambition? I failed miserably and thought it was my own fault. You can't unite woman and human any more than you can unite matter and anti-matter; they are designed to not to be stable together and they make just as big an explosion inside the head of the unfortunate girl who believes in both. ~ Joanna Russ

The idea that any art is achieved 'intuitively' is a dehumanization of the brains, effort, and the traditions of the artist, and a classification of said artist as subhuman. It is those supposed incapable of intelligence, training, or connection with a tradition who are described as working by instinct or intuition. ~ Joanna Russ

I have had my share of trouble and sickness but always somewhere in me there is a little spot of warmth and joy to make it all easier, like a traveler's fire burning out in the wilderness on a cold night. ~ Joanna Russ

How withered away one can be from a life of unremitting toil. ~ Joanna Russ

Men succeed. Women get married.
Men fail. Women get married.
Men enter monasteries. Women get married.
Men start wars. Women get married.
Men stop them. Women get married. ~ Joanna Russ

I once asked a young dissertation writer whether her suddenly grayed hair was due to ill health or personal tragedy; she answered: "It was the footnotes". ~ Joanna Russ

I often wonder why women have careers,' said Shredded Napkin suddenly, showing his teeth. I don't think he can possibly be saying what I think he's saying. He isn't, of course. Never mind. I'll stand this because Reality is dishing it out and I suppose I ought to learn to adjust to it. Besides, he may be sincere. There is a human being in there. At least he isn't telling me about something he read in the paper on women's liberation and then laughing at it. ~ Joanna Russ

If you are a woman and wish to become pre-eminent in a field, it's a good idea to (a) invent it and (b) locate it in an area either so badly paid or of such low status that men don't want it ~ Joanna Russ

You can't imbibe someone's success by f*cking them. ~ Joanna Russ

I think," said my neighbour, her chin very high in the air (and still spiffed, I am glad to say) "that women who've never married and never had children have missed out on the central experiences of life. They are emotionally crippled."
Now what am I supposed to say to that? I ask you. That women who've never won the Nobel Peace Prize have also experienced a serious deprivation? It's like taking candy from a baby; the poor thing isn't allowed to get angry, only catty. I said, "That's rude, and silly," and helped her to mashed potatoes.
... "You can't catch a man."
"That's why I'll never be abandoned," said I. Fortunately she did not hear me. Did I say taking candy from babies? Rather, eating babies, killing babies, abandoning babies. So sad, so easy. ~ Joanna Russ

If you want to live forever you are dreadfully dangerous because you're not living now. ~ Joanna Russ

Ignorance is not bad faith. But persistence in ignorance is. ~ Joanna Russ

The little blue book was rattling around in my purse. I took it out and turned to the last thing he had said ("You stupid broad et cetera). Underneath was written Girl backs down
cries
manhood vindicated. Under "Real Fight With Girl" was written Don't hurt (except whores). I took out my own pink book, for we all carry them, and turning to the instructions under "Brutality" found:
Man's bad temper is the woman's fault. It is also the woman's responsibility to patch things up afterwards.
There were sub-rubrics, one (reinforcing) under "Management" and one (exceptional) under "Martyrdom." Everything in my book begins with an M. ~ Joanna Russ

Somewhere there is a book that says you ought to cry buckets of tears over yourself and love yourself with a passion and wrap your arms around yourself; only then will you be happy and free. That's a good book. ~ Joanna Russ

Do not get glum when you are no longer understood, little book. Do not curse your fate. Do not reach up from readers' laps and punch the readers' noses.
Rejoice, little book!
For on that day, we will be free ~ Joanna Russ

Minority art, vernacular art, is marginal art. Only on the margins does growth occur. ~ Joanna Russ

I think from now on, I will not trust anyone who isn't angry. ~ Joanna Russ

Scholars don't usually sit gasping and sobbing in corners of the library stacks.
But they should. They should. ~ Joanna Russ

The game is a dominance game called I Must Impress This Woman. Failure makes the active player play harder. Wear a hunched back or a withered arm; you will then experience the invisibility of the passive player. I'm never impressed -- no woman ever is -- it's just a cue that you like me and I'm supposed to like that. If you really like me, maybe I can get you to stop. Stop; I want to talk to you! Stop; I want to see you! Stop; I'm dying and disappearing!
SHE: Isn't it just a game?
HE: Yes, of course.
SHE: And if you play the game, it means you like me, doesn't it?
HE: Of course.
SHE: Then if it's just a game and you like me, you can stop playing. Please stop.
HE: No.
SHE: Then I won't play.
HE: Bitch! You want to destroy me. I'll show you. (He plays harder)
SHE: All right. I'm impressed.
HE: You really are sweet and responsive after all. You've kept your femininity. You're not one of those hysterical feminist bitches who wants to be a man and have a penis. You're a woman.
SHE: Yes. (She kills herself) ~ Joanna Russ

Finding The Man. Keeping The Man. Not scaring The Man, building up The Man, following The Man, soothing The Man, flattering The Man, deferring to The Man, changing your judgement for The Man, changing your decisions for The Man, polishing floors for The Man, being perpetually conscious of your appearance for The Man, being romantic for The Man, hinting to The Man, losing yourself in The Man. 'I never had a thought that wasn't yours.' Sob, sob. Whenever I act like a human being, they say, 'What are you getting upset about?' They say: of course you'll get married. They say: of course you're brilliant. They say: of course you'll get a PhD and then sacrifice it to have babies. They say: if you don't, you're the one who'll have two jobs and you can make a go of it if you're exceptional, which very few women are, and if you find a very understanding man. As long as you don't make more money than he does. How do they expect me to live all this junk? ~ Joanna Russ

And here, of course, we come to the one occupation of a female protagonist in literature, the one thing she can do, and by God she does it and does it and does it, over and over and over again.
She is the protagonist of a Love Story. ~ Joanna Russ

I'm a sick woman, a madwoman, a ball-breaker, a man-eater; I don't consume men gracefully with my fire-like red hair or my poisoned kiss; I crack their joints with these filthy ghoul's claws and standing on one foot like a de-clawed cat, rake at your feeble efforts to save yourselves with my taloned hinder feet: my matted hair, my filthy skin, my big fat plaques of green bloody teeth. I don't think my body would sell anything. I don't think I'd be good to look at. O of all diseases self-hate is the worst and I don't mean for the one who suffers it! ~ Joanna Russ

What did we talk about?

I don't remember. We talked so hard and sat so still that I got cramps in my knee. We had too many cups of tea and then didn't want to leave the table to go to the bathroom because we didn't want to stop talking. You will think we talked of revolution but we didn't. Nor did we talk of our own souls. Nor of sewing. Nor of babies. Nor of departmental intrigue. It was political if by politics you mean the laboratory talk that characters in bad movies are perpetually trying to convey (unsuccessfully) when they Wrinkle Their Wee Brows and say (valiantly--dutifully--after all, they didn't write it) "But, Doctor, doesn't that violate Finagle's Constant?" I staggered to the bathroom, released floods of tea, and returned to the kitchen to talk. It was professional talk. It left my grey-faced and with such concentration that I began to develop a headache. We talked about Mary Ann Evans' loss of faith, about Emily Brontë's isolation, about Charlotte Brontë's blinding cloud, about the split in Virginia Woolf's head and the split in her economic condition. We talked about Lady Murasaki, who wrote in a form that no respectable man would touch, Hroswit, a little name whose plays "may perhaps amuse myself," Miss Austen, who had no more expression in society than a firescreen or a poker. They did not all write letters, write memoirs, or go on the stage. Sappho--only an ambiguous, somewhat disagreeable name. Corinna? The teacher of Pindar. Olive Schriener, gr ~ Joanna Russ

In college, educated women (I found out) were frigid; active women (I knew) were neurotic; women (we all knew) were timid, incapable, dependent, nurturing, passive, intuitive, emotional, unintelligent, obedient, and beautiful. You can always get dressed up and go to a party. Woman is the gateway to another world; Woman is the earth-mother; Woman is the eternal siren; Woman is purity; Woman is carnality; Woman has intuition; Woman is the life-force; Woman is selfless love.

"I am the gateway to another world," (said I, looking in the mirror) "I am the earth-mother; I am the eternal siren; I am purity," (Jeez, new pimples) "I am carnality; I have intuition; I am the life-force; I am selfless love." (Somehow it sounds different in the first person, doesn't it?)

Honey (said the mirror, scandalised) Are you out of your fucking mind?
I AM HONEY
I AM RASPBERRY JAM
I AM A VERY GOOD LAY
I AM A GOOD DATE
I AM A GOOD WIFE
I AM GOING CRAZY
Everything was peaches and cream. ~ Joanna Russ

For years I said Let me in, Love me, Approve me, Define me, Regulate me, Validate me, Support me. Now I say Move over. ~ Joanna Russ

Thus in the bad days, in the dark swampy times. ~ Joanna Russ

How am I to put this together with my human life, my intellectual life, my solitude, my transcendence, my brains, and my fearful, fearful ambition? ~ Joanna Russ

Aggressive and bellicose persons," said Janet with care, "always assume that unaggressive and pacific persons cannot protect themselves.
"Why is that? ~ Joanna Russ

Leaning her silly, beautiful, drunken head on my shoulder, she said, "Oh, Esther, I don't want to be a feminist. I don't enjoy it. It's no fun."
"I know," I said. "I don't either." People think you decide to be a "radical," for God's sake, like deciding to be a librarian or a ship's chandler. You "make up your mind," you "commit yourself" (sounds like a mental hospital, doesn't it?).
I said Don't worry, we could be buried together and have engraved on our tombstone the awful truth, which some day somebody will understand:
WE WUZ PUSHED. ~ Joanna Russ

What future is there for a female child who aspires to being Humpfrey Bogart? ~ Joanna Russ

Faith is not contrary to the usual ideas, something that turns out to be right or wrong, like a gambler's bet. ~ Joanna Russ

Fantasy is reality. Aristotle says that music is the most realistic of the arts because it represents the movements of the soul directly. Surely the mode of fantasy (which includes many genres and effects) is the only way in which some realities can be treated.

I grew up in United States in the 1950s, in a world in which fantasy was supposed to be the opposite of reality. 'Rational,' 'mature' people were concerned only with a narrowly defined 'reality' and only the 'immature' or the 'neurotic' (all-purpose put-downs) had any truck with fantasy, which was then considered to be wishful thinking, escapism, and other bad things, attractive only to the weak and damaged. Only Communists, feminists, homosexuals and other deviants were unsatisfied with Things As They Were at the time and Heaven help you if you were one of those.

I took to fantasy like a duckling to water. Unfortunately for me, there was nobody around then to tell me that fantasy was the most realistic of arts, expressing as it does the contents of the human soul directly. ~ Joanna Russ

She said that instead of conquering Everest, I could conquer the conqueror of Everest and while he had to go climb the mountain, I could stay home in lazy comfort listening to the radio and eating chocolates. She was upset, I suppose, but you can't imbibe someone's success by fucking them. ~ Joanna Russ

Anyway everyboy (sorry) knows that what women have done that is really important is not to constitute a great, cheap labor force that you can zip in when you're at war and zip out again afterwards but to Be Mothers, to form the coming generation, to give birth to them, to nurse them, to mop floors for them, to love them, cook for them, clean for them, change their diapers, pick up after them, and mainly sacrifice themselves for them. This is the most important job in the world. That's why they don't pay you for it. ~ Joanna Russ

This book is written in blood.
Is it written entirely in blood?
No, some of it is written in tears.
Are the blood and tears all mine?
Yes, they have been in the past, but the future is a different matter.
As the bear swore in Pogo after having endured a pot shoved on her head, being turned upside down while still in the pot, a discussion about her edibility, the lawnmowering of her behind, and a fistful of ground pepper in the snoot, she then swore a mighty oath on the ashes of her mothers (i.e. her forebears) grimly but quietly while the apples from the shaken apple tree above her dropped bang thud on her head:
OH, SOMEBODY ASIDES ME IS GONNA RUE THIS HERE PARTICULAR DAY. ~ Joanna Russ

Never point a gun unless you're ready to end a life. -Horse ~ Joanna Wylde

Well, yeah, I wanted to resist the urge to thicken everything up with instrumentation, because I just felt like I was interested in seeing how the songs did on their own. ~ Joanna Newsom

Is Joanna Gaines here? We have a warrant here for her arrest," the officer said.
It was the tickets. I knew it. And I panicked. I picked up my son and I hid in the closet. I literally didn't know what to do. I'd never even had a speeding ticket, and all of a sudden I'm thinking, I'm about to go to prison, and my child won't be able to eat. What is this kid gonna do?
I heard Chip say, "She's not here."
Thankfully, Drake didn't make a peep, and the officer believed him. He said, "Well, just let her know we're looking for her," and they left.

Jo's the most conservative girl in the world. She had never even been late for school. I mean, this girl was straitlaced. So now we realize there's a citywide warrant out for her arrest, and we're like, "Oh, crap." In her defense, Jo had wanted to pay those tickets off all along, and I was the one saying, "No way. I'm not paying these tickets." So we decided to try to make it right. We called the judge, and the court clerk told us, "Okay, you have an appointment at three in the afternoon to discuss the tickets. See you then." We wanted to ask the judge if he could remove a few of them for us. "The fines for our dogs "running at large" on our front porch just seemed a bit excessive.

We arrived at the courthouse, and Chip was carrying Drake in his car seat. I couldn't carry it because I was still recovering from Drake's delivery. We got inside and spoke to a clerk. They looked at the circumstances and deci ~ Joanna Gaines

Having negative thoughts and feelings means I'm a normal human being. ~ Russ Harris

Chip had been in there for a few very long hours. I had all kinds of awful thoughts about what might have happened to him in there. What if he'd been roughed up? Strip-searched? Who knows what awful things could have happened in a place like that? I saw scary-looking characters come and go as I sat in that cold, concrete lobby, trying to make myself invisible.
Finally, out came Chip.
"Hi, baby. Thanks for bailing me out," he said.
He sounded almost chipper.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah, yeah! You'll never guess who I saw in there. Alfonzo! Remember the lawn guy who used to work for me? We had a good time catching up."
Only Chip could go to prison and come out talking about all the friends he'd run into there.

I came out and I was like, "Whoa! That was awesome. Jo, I met this guy. He did this thing. You know this old guy that I used to tell you about--he and I used to work together? He's doing great. Well, he's in jail, but things are really good otherwise."
Two of the policemen were also buddies of mine. These guys were literally standing on the other side of these bars going, "Why are you here? What's the deal?" We had this endearing conversation right there, while I was in a jail cell.
I used to live out in the boonies when I was in college, and I had mowed this one guy's grass. So I told him what I was in for. "Long story short, I got these dogs running around." And he was like, "Oh, dude, you'll be fine. I'm sure they'll get you ~ Joanna Gaines

People say it was the greatest individual rivalry they've ever seen. I agree with that. Let me assure you that if either Wilt's or Russ' coach had ever told one of them he couldn't guard the other guy, he would have lost that player forever. ~ Bill Russell

In ACT, whether a thought is true is not that important. Far more important is whether it's helpful. ~ Russ Harris

Americans rightly asked, if this is the way our government responds to a natural disaster it knew about days in advance, how would it respond to a surprise terrorist attack? How would it respond to an earthquake? ~ Russ Carnahan

It didn't occur to me that I was glistening with sweat and wearing a bikini top until they turned off the bikes, pulled off their helmets and turned to scope me out. To make my own personal cliché perfect, Def Leppard's Pour Some Sugar On Me blasted through the radio. I winced – I must look like a white-trash princess from hell, basking outside my trailer in a bikini to outdated butt rock. ~ Joanna Wylde

Romance is quite an overblown word. This idea of chocolates and champagne and that's it. There's more to love than that. Romance is quite a soppy word. Love is much more important. ~ Joanna Lumley

Because sometimes you need to sing and dance. Even if you are eighty. Even if your bones push into your flesh, and the slightest breeze could steal you away. ~ Joanna Cannon, Three Things About Elsie

I promise," she said softly, biting her lip. "I will never shoot you by accident." I considered her response. "That's less comforting than you'd think. ~ Joanna Wylde

Make your decision and go for your dreams before it gets too late. For that time will never stop for you ~ Russ

Film work is hard work. It's long days, and quite often quite dismaying locations you have to be in. ~ Joanna Lumley

This time he jerked the appendage from her soft lap and tucked it under his leg, Indian fashion. ~ Joanna Jordan

I can understand someone not liking the voice or the songs. ~ Joanna Newsom

Not sure I know what real is … but I don't believe in love, babe. I believe in gettin' laid."
"That's the saddest thing I've ever heard. ~ Joanna Wylde

The Illusion of Control ~ Russ Harris

It is no easy thing to trust in God, to walk away from a career, to give it all up not knowing if you can ever get it back or even come close. But I did it. I heeded his voice, and somehow I found peace about it. ~ Joanna Gaines

Distract yourself, that's what Margaret always told him. When you start getting anxious, give your mind something else to think about. He had become an expert at distracting himself. He had distracted himself so much, he found himself drowning in distractions, and all the little details in the world seemed to join up together in his head and make a whole new problem to worry about. ~ Joanna Cannon

A willing heart adds feather to the heel. ~ Joanna Baillie

I don't lose my temper. I used to, but I realised I would probably die of a brain hemorrhage. So I've governed myself not to mind about things. I have no road rage or anything like that. Because it's life-shortening. And also, there's no need for it; it uses up energy. ~ Joanna Lumley

When I finally calmed down, I saw how disappointed he was and how bad he felt. I decided to take a deep breath and try to think this thing through.
"Maybe it's not that bad," I said. (I think I was trying to cheer myself up as much as I was trying to console Chip.) "If we fix up the interior and just get it to the point where we can get it onto the water, at least maybe then we can turn around, sell it, and get our money back."
Over the course of the next hour or so, I really started to come around. I took another walk through the boat and started to picture how we could make it livable--maybe even kind of cool. After all, we'd conquered worse. We tore a few things apart right then and there, and I grabbed some paper and sketched out a new layout for the tiny kitchen. I talked to him about potentially finishing an accent wall with shiplap--a kind of rough-textured pine paneling that fans of our show now know all too well.
"Shiplap?" Chip laughed. "That seems a little ironic to use on a ship, doesn't it?"
"Ha-ha," I replied. I was still not in the mood for his jokes, but this is how Chip backs me off the ledge--with his humor. ~ Joanna Gaines

Back in the late 1800s, when a place like this was originally built, you had to work with what you had, and you had to figure stuff out. You certainly couldn't Google it. You didn't have Internet. You didn't even have how-to books. You had to sit there and wrestle with it. You found this old spare part, you did this other thing, you hooked it up to a donkey, and you tried it out.
Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn't. But eventually you'd pop out on the other side and say, "I've got this."
Call me old-fashioned, but I've always solved problems like that.
-Chip Gaines ~ Joanna Gaines

You can't be vain as an actor. In 'Ab Fab,' we were made up as old women with bald wigs and jowly necks, and we looked fantastic. ~ Joanna Lumley

When you knew what you wanted, everything became simpler, more streamlined. ~ Joanna Cantor

That's when it all hit me and I started laughing. I'd just had incredible, indescribable sex with the hottest guy I'd ever met - and I was still a fucking virgin. Jesus. Just like high school. I couldn't give this shit away. ~ Joanna Wylde

What do you mean, Jesus?' May Roper pulled the crocheted sea a little further up her legs.
'On the drainpipe. I've seen Him with my own eyes.'
'Have you been in the sun again, Brian?'
'Sheila Dakin thinks it's a sign.'
'A sign she's been at the sherry. ~ Joanna Cannon

In 1795, I sent him another letter, telling him, that danger still stood before us, and that the truth of what I had written in 1792 was to be proved by 12 men. ~ Joanna Southcott

When you're someone's property, you're a woman the brothers will die to protect," he continued, his voice softening. "They'll die to protect your kid, too. Don't turn that kind of loyalty into something ugly because you don't like the words we use. Dancer, Marie, Maggs? They're proud to be property, because they know what it means. Nobody forcing them to do anything. ~ Joanna Wylde

Abruptly, he wheeled Shadow into a full turn, stopped, and yanked his rifle out of the sheath on his saddle. ~ Joanna Jordan

I can't remember the last time someone intrigued me as you do." He ~ Joanna Chambers

You're cute when you're pissed. Kind of like a wet kitten. Gets me hard. ~ Joanna Wylde

You're pretty sassy this morning, son. Is it all about Reingold's rulings?"
"That didn't suck, but I've got me a fascinating, beautiful woman I'm falling for. Falling hard."
"Quick work."
"In the blood. My mama and daddy barely did more than look at each other, and that was that. She's got me, Russ. Right here." He tapped a fist on his heart.
"Surely it's not considerably lower where she's got you?"
"There, too. But, Jesus, Russ, she does it for me. I just think about her, and ... I swear I could look at her for hours. Days."
Brooks let out a half-laugh, edged with a little surprise. "I'm done. I'm gone. ~ Nora Roberts

One cannot walk straight when the path is crooked. A BALDONI SAYING ~ Joanna Bourne

It is time this Congress listened to the American people and minimum-wage workers, and it is time that we act. ~ Russ Carnahan

Writing that flirts with incoherence can just as readily flounder as writing characterized by simplicity and composure. There is no reliable formula for originality, and strategies that are distinguished as innovative in their first incarnation can quickly become stale in the hands of lesser artists. ~ Joanna Scott

As a first-generation Ethiopian immigrant, Sheba had lived in Charleston since she turned five years of age. She was Ethiopian by birth, but American by preference. She had worked hard, studied and sacrificed plenty to get where she was today, no easy feat for someone who had just celebrated her twenty-sixth birthday. According to her friends, Sheba was a beauty, though when she looked in the mirror, she saw inevitable flaws; her cheekbones were too pronounced, her mouth a little too wide, her nose with that perturbing slant to it. Still, she accepted compliments gratefully, especially from her roommate, Janelle. Janelle was the true beauty, Sheba thought, with dark ebony skin so smooth that she could be a walking ad for Ghirardelli Dark Chocolate. ~ Joanna Hynes

ME: Thanks ((hugs)) LIAM: You got my full support, babe, but I draw the line at texting hugs. It's a guy thing. I start doing that shit, the other guys'll confiscate my dick. Can't risk it ~ Joanna Wylde

In the ongoing celebration that is literature, we are asked to imagine ourselves as other selves, for better or worse. ~ Joanna Scott

Me + Love Songs on KOST=embarrassing car jam sesh. ~ Joanna Garcia

He surrounded himself with fools - the broken, the failed or failing, the sad and confused - so that he might be their king. Which, obviously made him nothing but the king of fools. ~ Joanna Rakoff

Babe, I nearly shot Skid in the ass one time because a spider fell on me while I was holding a gun," I finally managed to say. "Those things freak me right the hell out. They got eight fuckin' legs, and that ain't natural. That's some Dr. Seuss shit right there. ~ Joanna Wylde

Russ decided the best defense was a good offense. "I'm Russell Van Alstyne, Millers Kill chrief of police." He held out his hand. She shook firm, like a guy.
"Clare Fergusson," she said. "I'm the new priest at Saint Alban's. That's the Episcopal Church. At the corner of Elm and Church." there was a faint testiness in her voice. Russ relaxed a fraction. A woman priest. If that didn't beat all.
"I know which it is. There are only four churches in town." He saw the fog creeping along the edges of his glasses again and snatched them off, fishing for a tissue in his pocket. "Can you tell me what happened, um ... " What was he supposed to call her? "Mother?"
"I go by Reverend, Chief. Ms. is fine, too."
"Oh. Sorry. I never met a woman priest before."
"We're just like the men priests, except we're willing to pull over and ask directions. ~ Julia Spencer-Fleming

I'm a pathetic haggler and often give more than the original price out of a misplaced sense of duty. ~ Joanna Lumley

I always love writing about children. ~ Joanna Trollope

The beauty of problem-solving is that, unlike punishment, it offers endless possibilities. If you're committed to punishment and your child continues to misbehave, all you can do is punish more severely. You might hit him harder or take away more privileges, but chances are you won't get any closer to your goal of having a cooperative child. And you'll create a lot of ill will in the process. With problem-solving, you can always go back and brainstorm some more. When you put your heads together, you're bound to come up with something that will work for both of you. ~ Joanna Faber

Painter's mouth dropped down to my ear, catching it in his teeth just tight enough to hurt. I felt the hardness between his legs grinding into me as need exploded through my body. He smelled so good . . . My hips twisted, desperate for more. Painter groaned. ~ Joanna Wylde