Rachel Burton > Quotes

“Since she'd left she hadn't felt attracted to anybody and wasn't interested in changing that. She wanted to learn to live with herself, to love herself, to be happy with her own company”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“When a reader picks up a romance novel they know that happy ending exists. They don’t have to worry about what will happen and they can just get totally immersed in how it happens. Sometimes when life deals you a few blows that kind of thing is important.”
― Rachel Burton, A Bookshop Christmas

“that doesn’t give you the right to be snobby about genre fiction. Reading is completely subjective and most readers read all kinds of different books. Being a snob about genre is like pretending that reading on e-readers or listening to audiobooks is somehow not proper reading. It’s ridiculous.”
― Rachel Burton, A Bookshop Christmas

“A wave of irritation washed over her. These privileged men had no idea how easy it was for them, drifting into education knowing their father's money would bail them out - when Stella was saving every penny she had, desperate to get a chance to read for a PhD. Stella was three times as smart as most of them too”
― Rachel Burton, The Secrets of Summer House

“It’s elitist to be so snobby about books,” I said. “Just because somebody loves to read romance or crime novels doesn’t mean they don’t also love to read Ovid or Shakespeare or Dickens or McEwan – who all write about love by the way”
― Rachel Burton, A Bookshop Christmas

“Grief is hard," she says. "And strange. Try to sit with your feelings as much as you can. try to accept there is no 'normal' when it comes to grieving.”
― Rachel Burton, The Secrets of Summer House

“Yes but your little village is something else. Everyone knows each other. I mean, everyone knew each other at Oxford, but this is like a proper community.' He had the enthusiasm for the English village of somebody who has never lived in one”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“in his three-piece suit it takes”
― Rachel Burton, The Many Colours of Us

“And now Tash's library is being pulled down. The village in Suffolk where Olivia grew up doesn't have a mobile library anymore either. How are kids meant to discover the joy of books when there aren't any libraries for them to disappear into?”
― Rachel Burton, The Secrets of Summer House

“She often comes into her sister's room after dinner as though she is afraid to be alone. I think when she is alone she feels the sadness of the house a little more than usual”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“I guess that sometimes what we think we want isn't good for us in the end”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“Did she say where in Australia?’ Meredith wondered if Australia was where her dad ended up too. Not that even that explained why he hadn’t been in touch. ‘Hobart, in Tasmania.’ Meredith tried very hard not to let it show in her face that she wasn’t really sure where Tasmania was other than one of those places they sent characters from Australian soap operas to when it was their time to leave. ‘It’s the little island at the bottom of Australia,’ Zach said with a smile. ‘I had to look it up.”
― Rachel Burton, The Butterfly Garden

“And it made me realise what women are capable of when they allow themselves, when they break free from what society tells them they need to be”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“Olivia hadn't understood about not sleeping well until Jacob started to travel so much. When the person you are used to sleeping next to isn't there anymore, sleep becomes increasingly elusive”
― Rachel Burton, The Secrets of Summer House

“I can't remember a time when I didn't want to read. My mother taught me my letters before I started at the little village school and I would pull out one of the few books that we had at home and try to make sense of those letters on the page”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“But I've never been convinced about this idea of hierarchy, that some of us are better than others simply by way of our birth. Surely only fate decides that and we are all the same really. We all deserve the same opportunities”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“The fact that Viola and Sebastian had drifted apart hadn't happened on purpose; it wasn't anybody's fault. It had just been the result of two people running away from their own feelings when they should have been talking to each other.”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“I am a different person to the one who left home five years before and that is partly to do with the other staff at Haverford. They have become friends. I hadn't realised I was lonely before when I lived at home. Perhaps it's not until things change that we notice what they were like before”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“man”
― Rachel Burton, The Last Party at Silverton Hall

“whale on Ben’s KeepCup. ‘But you think he’s Russian caravan”
― Rachel Burton, The Tearoom on the Bay

“died in a car accident,”
― Rachel Burton, The Secrets of Summer House

“Thinking about the ‘what ifs’ isn’t very helpful. I should be thinking about the ‘what nows’.”
― Rachel Burton, The Many Colours of Us

“But I imagine I will grow to love him. He is incredibly handsome after all. It's hard to marry for love when you are the daughter of an earl. You either marry for connection or, as is the case with us, for money. Lots of the bloody stuff”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“It isn't right if you ask me,' Cook says. 'Women have no need of an education.' 'Well luckily nobody is asking you,' Mrs Derbyshire snaps at her, showing a rare glimpse into her inner thoughts. 'Women have as much right to an education as men”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House

“Art is less about what you see,’ he said. ‘And more about how you feel when you see it.”
― Rachel Burton, The Last Party at Silverton Hall

“Male violence seems to be something women have lived with since time began," Viola said, biting back her own tears. "And nothing has changed," Emily replied. "Nothing ever changes.”
― Rachel Burton, The Mystery of Haverford House