Erika Swyler > Quotes

“Once you’ve held a book and really loved it, you forever remember the feel of it, its specific weight, the way it sits in your hand.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Perhaps the book opened a door; books have a way of causing ripples.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Having all the time in the world makes getting things done impossible.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“We carry our families like anchors, rooting us in storms, making sure we never drift from where and who we are. We carry our families within us the way we carry our breath underwater, keeping us afloat, keeping us alive.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“If it’s possible to have a reading hangover, I have one.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“A librarian remembers the particular scent of glue and dust, and if we’re so lucky—and I was—the smell of parchment, a quiet tanginess, softer than wood pulp or cotton rag. We would bury ourselves in books until flesh and paper became one and ink and blood at last ran together.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Because there are things you do for people you’ve known your whole life. You let them save you, you put them in your books, and you let each other begin again, clean.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“We carry our families like anchors, rooting us in storms, making sure we never drift from where and who we are. We carry our families within us the way we carry our breath underwater, keeping us afloat, keeping us alive. I’ve been lifting anchors since I was eighteen. I’ve been holding my breath since before I was born.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Hard thoughts are held in small words.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Nobody loves you quite like someone who's sorry.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Why the hell don't people understand there are some things you don't talk about? You keep it to yourself so you hurt fewer people. You're supposed to pay with guilt. Guilt is penance.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Once you’ve held a book and really loved it, you forever remember the feel of it, its specific weight, the way it sits in your hand. My thumb knows the grain of this book’s leather, the dry dust of red rot that’s crept up its spine, each waving leaf of every page that holds a little secret or one of Peabody’s flourishes. A librarian remembers the particular scent of glue and dust, and if we’re so lucky—and I was—the smell of parchment, a quiet tanginess, softer than wood pulp or cotton rag. We would bury ourselves in books until flesh and paper became one and ink and blood at last ran together. So maybe my hand does clench too tightly to the spine. I may never again hold another book this old, or one with such a whisper of me in it.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“How good it was that people, like houses, had frames and that those frames could be so beautiful.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Headaches were like birds. Starlings. They could be perfectly calm, then a single acorn could drop and send the entire flock to the sky.”
― Erika Swyler, The Mermaid Girl: A Story

“Something is very wrong. What began as a passing fascination with the book has turned into something darker,”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“She'd started swimming early in the morning, when the kids were asleep, when she thought he was asleep. She didn't know her absence woke him, that the shift in the bed was an earthquake. When she climbed back in, she smelled like salt and seaweed. Sometimes her hair would still be knotted on top of her head. She tried to keep it dry. She didn't want him to know. The problem with marrying the mermaid girl from the carnival was knowing that one day she'd swim away.”
― Erika Swyler

“It’s sort of like a hobby, but kind of like addiction?” he says, voice tipping up as he cocks his head. “You think you’re gonna get just one, but then one starts looking really good with another and before you know it you want every piece of you drawn on. I wish I had more space. Some people don’t like their skin, you know?” He pops a piece of broccoli into his mouth, using his fingers. “I picked mine.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Even in a sea of names, a drowning mermaid has a way of standing out.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Half the charm in old books is the marks of living they acquire;”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“I need to get into the water, to clear my head.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“I think sometimes it is difficult to look after ourselves,' he said, thoughtfully. 'We look to friends to do it for us.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Nothing made you angry like missing someone.”
― Erika Swyler, Light from Other Stars

“People spend their entire lives moving back and forth over the same water, moving but staying.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“You killed him too. It just took longer.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Sometimes you made love to a man because you wanted your body to feel something other than the aches and pains of use. Sometimes you made love to man because he looked so good that you wanted to try him on. Sometimes you made love to a man because he fathered your children, he made you a home, he loved you, and he staunched the parts of you that were always bleeding. Sometimes you made love to a man because you felt split in two, and joining with him pulled you back together.”
― Erika Swyler, The Mermaid Girl: A Story

“She is half a soul, hungry or another...

The girl, she may not know, but she will drink your soul. She cannot help it. Half a soul will kill to be whole.”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Inventions were not like your children. Your children were all your flaws shown to you in a way that made you love them: your worst made good. Inventions were your best attempt at beautiful thought. They were objective; they worked or they did not. They had purpose, whether they achieved it or not. They were yours always, in that they did not leave you, or turn away.”
― Erika Swyler, Light from Other Stars

“Everything felt wrong. She needed to go home, to her dad’s small lab in the basement, to curl up on one of the tables like she used to. It had been a long time since she’d last brought a quilt down and made a nest for herself among the books, tubes, and wires—a million years or however long it took light to travel. She’d rest her cheek on the table and listen to her dad talk about space. She’d been little when he’d told her about the beginning of the universe and how the solar system was born. How the sun was like an island, and the planets were ships sailing around it. He’d said, “Pluto is our far star sailor,” the way other people said Once upon a time. His words opened a door inside her. She wished she’d brought her NASA book, with six full pages on the “Thirty-Five New Guys,” the Astronaut Class of 1978, NASA’s first new group of astronauts since 1969. On Sally Ride, on Challenger—which she realized was gone now—on Judy Resnik, mission specialist, the second American woman in space. Who Nedda wanted to be. Who was gone now too. They were gas and carbon—and what else? They had to be something else. She wanted her stupid little-kid pony, but it was in the classroom. She wanted to go fishing with Denny, even if it was too cold. She wanted to smell her mother’s perfume until she was sick from it. She wanted to eat all the icing roses off that stupid cake until Betheen yelled.”
― Erika Swyler, Light from Other Stars

“With life blooming inside her, the water answered her questions with a whispered yes, and part of her knew home. In a tidal river on the Virginia coast she encountered a peculiar creature that scuttled the riverbed. She held it up and examined the graceful curve of its shell, its neat spike of a tail, and spidery feet that kicked and scratched at the air as she cradled it in her palm. A wonder just for her, she thought. The flickering of a child inside her laughed. Evangeline”
― Erika Swyler, The Book of Speculation

“Every week Dr. Stein asked, “What do you see out the window?” Her stylus was never on camera, but Nedda could hear it sliding across a tablet. It was difficult to explain what she saw, harder still to parse its meaning. Space between stars made for easy misery, contemplating how small you were when faced with the universe. Though he was mission commander, Amit Singh looked out as little as possible, preferring star maps, feeds from the telescopes, and data from the probes and terraformers. He remained intent on viewing himself as a person and not a single cell in an organism the size of the universe. Nedda liked feeling small. “Endless space is endless potential,” she’d told Dr. Stein. It was good to sound hopeful. It was trickier to explain that she was looking for light, picking it apart, trying to sense the different wavelengths, searching for the familiar. There was light in the black, on its way to and from distant planets, light from stars crashing into one another, meeting in the space between. Light carried thoughts and hopes, the essence of what made everyone.”
― Erika Swyler, Light from Other Stars