Jenna Brooks > Quotes

“If you have survived an abuser, and you tried to make things right… If you forgave, and you struggled, and even if the expression of your grief and your anger tumbled out at times in too much rage and too many words… If you spent years hanging on to the concepts of faith, hope, and love, even after you knew in your heart that those intangibles, upon which life is formed and sustained, would fail in the end… And especially, if you stood between your children - or anyone - and him, and took the physical, emotional, and spiritual pummeling in their stead, then you are a hero.”
― Jenna Brooks

“I admired so many things about you. Almost everything. But I don’t want to wind up like you. I don’t want to starve to death, all alone on some island inside my own head. Hopeless.”
― Jenna Brooks, October Snow

“...that’s where love is revealed: in abandoning the outcome, casting the self aside, inviting the consequences that will come. Even if the love we offer to others is not received – which may be the definition of loneliness – that doesn’t mean it ceases to exist, because real love ignores the cost, braves the darkness, lights the way. The true measure of the love within the human heart is inversely proportional to the price one is willing to pay to express it.”
― Jenna Brooks

“Don’t cheat people out of loving you, and love them back - right where they stand. And if they turn away, let you down, leave you feeling mocked… Well, you’ll survive the true fools of the world. You’ll grow wise from the experience, if you don’t hide yourself away.

Live with your heart wide-open. The one thing you must know, to avoid falling into cynicism, is this:

Be careful of asking for nothing at all - because that's what you'll end up with.”
― Jenna Brooks

“...avoid – like the measles – phony laughter. No, really. If you don’t find it to be funny, don't laugh. More evil and injustice has gotten a foothold in this world because of polite, counterfeit laughter – a desire to not “offend”, or to not be “peculiar” - than anything else.

But when you do laugh, let your belly shimmy.”
― Jenna Brooks

“You can't forgive if you don't acknowledge the offense.”
― Jenna Brooks, October Snow

“Simon leveled the gun at Will again. 'Now,' he said casually, 'someone's gonna die here in the next minute.'

On the other side of the two-way mirror, Sammy took aim.

'That's exactly right,' she whispered.”
― Jenna Brooks, An Early Frost

“It's all interrelated, these destructive things I do. I latch on to people, like I'm collecting them. I'm always looking for a hero, you know?”
― Jenna Brooks, An Early Frost