Slowly, without taking his eyes from hers, the man in the black coat knelt before her. ”I have come for the girl… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
She was not filled up with the sight of him, the way she had seen her sisters fill up, like silk balloons,… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
I do not tolerate a world emptied of you. I have tried. For a year I have called every black tree Marya… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
I will not let her speak because I love her, and when you love someone, you do not make them tell war… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
Husbands lie, Masha. I should know; I've eaten my share. That's lesson one. Lesson number two: among the topics about which a… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
When I say forever,' Koschei whispered, 'I mean until the black death of the world. An Ivan means just the present moment,… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
Oh, but Masha, can’t you see? You are. An Ivan has come. That is like saying, Midnight has struck. It is time… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
This is what it means to be a woman in this world. Every step is a bargain with pain. Make your black… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
Marriage is a wrestling match where you hold on tight while your mate changes into a hundred different things. The trick is… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
But the thought arrived inside her like a train: Marya Morevna, all in black, here and now, was a point at which… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
You will always go into that tent. You will see her scar and wonder where she got it. You will always be… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
The goblins of the city may hold committees to divide a single potato, but the strong and the cruel still sit on… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
..what came before has dissolved from me, lost like milk teeth. But I think, rather, that it has always been as it… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
When I saw him I thought I could curl up inside him and go to sleep and never wake up." "Men are no good… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
We all just keep moving, September. We keep moving until we stop. — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
“You couldn't ever really fix a sad story. You could only make another. And another. And another, until you found the right one at… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
“He considers it for a moment and spits out the seeds, which sprout, quickly, into tiny junkblossoms sizzling with recursive algorithms. The algorithms wriggle… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
“Truly, Mallow yearned to know everything. Curiosity was part of her, like her short blond hair and bitten fingernails.” — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
“The cicada lies in the earth for seventeen years. It is warm and dark there, it is soft and wet. Its little legs curl… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
We all live inside the terrible engine of authority, and it grinds and shrieks and burns so that no one will say: lines on… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
Her heart was bruised by the kiss, smashed and surprised and unsettled by it. September thought kisses were all nice, sweet things asked for… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
“September put her hand on the grip of the Rivet Gun. She’d only just gotten it, and she’d promised to take copious notes for… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
Just tell yourself a story that'll satisfy you and pretend he told it. — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
“You see, the future is a kind of stew, a soup, a vichyssoise of the present and the past. That's how you get the… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
Fairy tales have always been about getting through the worst of everything, the darkest and the deepest and the bloodiest of events. They are… — Catherynne M. Valente Copy Share Image
