Debbie Rix > Quotes

“It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend.’ – William Blake”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“When women take up a cause you can assume it has been won!’ Italian proverb”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“Money," he often said to Livia, "can be a curse as well as a comfort. Better to spend your life making a difference to people's lives, rather than counting coins in a vault.”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“Livia felt bereft as she waved goodbye to Elena and her father the following morning. It was unbearable to have been left up in the hill with her mother, out of harm's way, while down on the plain in Florence, the Resistance was forging ahead. She would never be content with an ordinary life, she realised. The business of running a home, loving a husband, raising a child, would never be enough for her. She yearned for danger, for challenges and excitement, and she was determined to get back to her real existence as soon as possible.”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“Imogen, is that you?’ ‘Yes, Mr Latimer…’ ‘Could you come in here please?’ Imogen hung her school coat and satchel over the banisters, and went into the kitchen at the back of the house. ‘Could you give me a bit of help? I really don’t know what to do – I’ve never cooked spam before, but there doesn’t seem to be much else.’ He opened the kitchen cupboard, revealing bare shelves. Imogen looked a little dubiously at the small oblong tin sitting on the Formica worktop.”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“lamb”
― Debbie Rix, The Photograph

“He laughed ironically as he pulled up outside her house. He turned to look at her. 'I don't think you understand how the real world works, Isabella.' He gazed at her and touched her cheek. 'You have lived in the world of make-believe for so long, you can't see the truth in front of your eyes.”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“Back on the train, travelling along the coast towards Nice, Isabella realised that Mimi had been right, She had spent ten years feeling she was entitled to the rewards of her hard work, that the money and position were what she deserved. Her relationships - such as they were - with the Fascist authorities were a necessary evil. But she had been lulled into a sense of false security; she had stopped seeing the world through other people's eyes and as a result had failed to understand the extent of their suffering. For the first time in her life she felt guilty about her privileged position.”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“the”
― Debbie Rix, The German Mother

“where we’ll get the money from.”
― Debbie Rix, The Photograph

“Medical research was always a balancing act between potentially harming a few in order to protect the many”
― Debbie Rix, The German Wife

“marriage should never be undertaken in a mad panic.”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“Livia felt her pulse quicken. She began to turn the pages of the paper, searching for a longer obituary. As she read about Isabella's life - of her wartime experiences, of the scandals, the trial - she thought back to those days during the war, when trust in Italy was in short supply, betrayal was everywhere and the world went mad.”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“Exhausted suddenly, she sat down heavily at her dressing table and studied her face in the mirror. She felt angry, but also impotent, trapped in a marriage with a man she no longer recognised. A man who had concealed from her the hideous work he was involved in - a man who had become a monster”
― Debbie Rix, The German Wife

“a gardener who came twice a week to mow the lawn and ‘do the heavy work’. Imogen wasn’t sure what ‘the heavy work’ meant, but it was obviously useful.”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“Joy’s first words to Imogen had sealed their relationship forever.”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“unpredictable British weather. Pray for sunshine, gentlemen. God bless you all…”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“We live in extraordinary times,' he murmured into her hair, 'where morality, duty and human decency are in short supply. I am surrounded at work by immense cruelty and it's because of what I see each day that I feel this is the only sensible course of action. I love you more than life itself, and it's because I love you that I can bear this. Just try... not to love him too much - and come back to me when it's done.”
― Debbie Rix, The German Wife

“Hurrying into the medical block, he felt a combination of horror and shame. This was not what he had signed up for. He had thought he would be allowed to do some good for mankind. But in fact he was just part of a brutal killing machine”
― Debbie Rix, The German Wife

“into a basement, shouting ‘Take cover,’ just as the American”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“What’s done is done. It’s the future that matters.”
― Debbie Rix, The German Wife

“By standing back and doing nothing, I allowed that evil policy to take root. While Hitler and the others were the perpetrators, I, we, the German people, allowed it to happen. For that, I can never forgive myself.”
― Debbie Rix, The German Mother

“brought”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“mark my words – no country’s problems, economic or otherwise, can be solved by young men marching around the streets, bullying people.”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“Photograph”
― Debbie Rix, The Italian Girls

“They had buried her mother eight years before in the same graveyard, and had never spoken of it again. It had been his way of coping, she had supposed - to bury his feelings along with the body, and just get on with it. Now, with her father gone, she wondered if his way of grieving had been the right way. Perhaps it was better to let the pain come to the surface and deal with it, head on”
― Debbie Rix, The German Wife

“As she opened the door to the dark hall she inhaled the comfortingly familiar scent of floor polish and beeswax, overlaid with the sour smell of overcooking vegetables and just a hint of dog.”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“If I’m pregnant then I shall have a child. And yes, it’s true – I don’t know who the father is. If it’s the child of one, then I will be happy. If it’s the child of the other, I don’t know what I will do… but either way, it’s not the child’s fault, is it?’ ‘Oh”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“was”
― Debbie Rix, The Secret Letter

“I'm not prejudiced,' replied Elisabetta. 'I discriminate... there's a difference, you know”
― Debbie Rix, The German Wife