Valrie Kirkconnell

“Siddalee looked at me like: You liar, Daddy, you big liar. I don’t know why I’m thinking”
― Rebecca Wells, Little Altars Everywhere

“Can you read?" the boy said at last.
"Of course," said Arrietty. "Can't you?"
"No," he stammered. "I mean--yes. I mean I've just come from India."
"What's that got to do with it?" asked Arrietty.
"Well, if you're born in India, you're bilingual. And if you're bilingual, you can't read. Not so well."
Arrietty stared up at him: what a monster, she thought, dark against the sky.
"Do you grow out of it?" she asked.
He moved a little and she felt the cold flick of his shadow.
"Oh yes," head said, "it wears off. My sisters were bilingual; now they aren't a bit. They could read any of those books upstairs in the schoolroom."
"So could I," said Arrietty quickly, "if someone could hold them, and turn the pages. I'm not a bit bilingual. I can read anything.”
― Mary Norton, Borrowers

“The summer sun bowing out threw slashes of colour between the buildings. London looked big, empty, and lonely. She stood in the doorway, like a cat trying to make up its mind.”
― Sara Pascoe, Being a Witch, and Other Things I Didn't Ask For

“Honorable men were keeping their word, my son, long before this Christian religion was proposed.”
― Lloyd C. Douglas, The Robe