Appalachian Quotes

“May your glass always be full, may there always be a roof over your head, and may you dirty sinners be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows you're dead.”
― Jason Jack Miller, HELLBENDER

“Or maybe when she realized that he was never going to come and rescue her, she did what all strong women do. She found a way to save herself.”
― Adriana Trigiani, Big Stone Gap

“I couldn’t describe the smells of West Virginia, even if I tried. It has something to do with the leaves composting in the woods, the cold trickle of little creeks and waterfalls, the ferns greening up everything. But somewhere deep below, I can smell the rock and the coal this state is built on.”
― Heather Day Gilbert, Miranda Warning

“Henry,that's how you get rid of fleas. You keep them from laying eggs. You go to war with them.”
― Jason Jack Miller, HELLBENDER

“When he leaned in to kiss me, the future swirled before me, bright as sunlight on creek water.”
― Heather Day Gilbert, Miranda Warning

“That fence has gotta 'lectric charge runnin' through it!" Duffy whispered. "Felt like I got struck by lightnin' right b'tween my shoulder blades! It crackled like when the barber turns on his trimmer."

Ott had had his suspicions about the electric fence, but there had been only one way to know for sure. That's why some people were generals and others were sergeants, after all.”
― Mark Warren, Moon of the White Tears

“A bit reluctantly, trying to leave my bruised ego behind, I was warming to the Appalachian idea.
Bourbon and branch water. Dulcimer music. Wildflowers in jelly jars. Biscuits and country ham. That did have a certain charm.”
― Judith Fertig, The Memory of Lemon

“Before embarking on this project, I doubt I ever truly properly appreciated precisely how urgent the various voices of the New Testament authors are, or how profound the provocations of what they were saying were for their own age, and probably remain for every age. Those voices blend, or at least interweave, in a kind of wildly indiscriminate polyphony, as if an early Baroque vocal trio, an Appalachian band, a couple of Viennese tenors piping twelve-tone Lieder, and a jazz crooner or two were all singing out together; but what all have in common, and what somehow forges a genuine harmony out of all that ecstatic clamor, is the vibrant certainty that history has been invaded by God in Christ in such a way that nothing can stay is it was, and that all terms of human community and conduct have been altered at the deepest of levels.”
― David Bentley Hart, The New Testament

“Appalachian food?"
"It's not given its proper due," Kel said. "But it's just as rich and diverse and interesting as every other cuisine."
I didn't know a ton about Appalachian food, but I knew it incorporated foods native to the Appalachian region and was sometimes stereotypically associated with times of hardship, when families had to feed a lot of people with very little. Buckwheat cakes. Vinegar pie. Stews and rabbits. Vegetables like morrels and ramps eaten fresh, or others canned in creative ways.”
― Amanda Elliot, Sadie on a Plate

“Chef Kel, your spoon bread and trumpet mushrooms were so rich you almost didn't need to add those shavings of ham on top," Maz said, then added a hearty laugh. "Though I'm sure glad you did. Almost as glad as I was for those bracingly vinegary sumac-pickled onions in the mix. They kept the dish from being over-the-top rich.”
― Amanda Elliot, Sadie on a Plate

“Call me the taker of the arduous trek, a seeker of the ultimate track”
― Brian S Woods, BEEN: Hidden Treasures of the Appalachian Highlands

“My limitations drive my doubt and tell me to trust only what I see. My inspiration drives my faith and tells me to hope in what I cannot see.”
― Thomas Trezise, Former Things Forgotten