Diane Williams

“I was a woman when it was convenient to blame me, and a girl when they wanted to use me.”
― Ava Reid, A Study in Drowning

“I wish I had fought.” Effy surprised herself by saying it. The words had leaped out of her throat, unbidden. “I know I beat him in the end, but for so many years all I could do was run and hide. I just sat there and let the water pour in around me. I didn’t know that I could fight back. I didn’t know how to do anything but wait to drown.”
“Oh no, Effy. That’s not what I meant at all. You don’t have to take up a sword. Survival is bravery, too.”
― Ava Reid, A Study in Drowning

“Effy hated that she couldn’t tell right from wrong, safe from unsafe. Her fear had transfigured the entire world. Looking at anything was like trying to glimpse a reflection in a broken mirror, all of it warped and shattered and strange.”
― Ava Reid, A Study in Drowning

“That was the cruelest irony: the more you did to save yourself, the less you became a person worth saving.”
― Ava Reid, A Study in Drowning