174 Quotes by Frances Hardinge

Maybe you couldn’t ever owe somebody your life, not really. You couldn’t let anyone else decide what you did with it. You had to live it yourself, as truly as you could.

Nobody’s mind ever remains a blank page, however carefully they are locked away from the world.

He felt like a chess-master who, two moves from achieving checkmate, suddenly sees a live kitten dropped on to the middle of the board, scattering pieces.

She was not undamaged, however, and she knew it. No food or drink had passed her lips, but she had drunk deep of the Truth, and now it could not be flushed out of her system with bitter cordials, or washed from her skin, or picked out of her hair.

C’era una vera e propria fame in lei, e alle ragazze non si cnfaceva essere fameliche. Le ragazze dovevano sbocconcellare con parsimonia a tavola. e le loro menti dovevano accontentarsi di una dieta morigerata. Ma tutto questo a lei non bastava. Tutta la conoscenza – ogni genere di conoscenza – attirava Faith, e c’era un piacere delizioso, pernicioso, nel carpirla senza essere scoperta.

I want my chirfugging goose back!

There was a reek in her nose, a slick dark green smell of water that was old enough to be clever and dangerous.

My child, you have a flawed grasp of the nature of myth-making. I am a poet and storyteller, a creator of ballads and sagas. Pray do not confuse the exercise of the imagination with mere mendacity. I am a master of the mysteries of words, their meanings and music and mellifluous magic.

I was always awake!” interrupted Faith. “I was always angry!