Irving Pepperman

“The summer of 2019 had overstayed its welcome in Florida,
lingering well into September. As if to make a point about global
warming, the rabid sun scorched the waters of Biscayne Bay for
weeks, generating a haze of humidity that blurred the line between
the windless sea and the sky above. Not to be accused of playing
favorites, the sun’s rays beat down on the land with equal spite,
pummeling grass, palms, and bushes into limp submission. The
heat weaponized asphalt roads and cement sidewalks, the shimmery
mirages above them a clear warning to all living things to stay away
or burn.”
― J.K. Franko, Eye for Eye

“He used to be a bad boy,” she said. “I looked him up on social media. Tattoos, always partying. And a musician.”
That I hadn’t expected. “Really?”
“He was a drummer before taking over his daddy’s empire. Very sexy.”
― J.J. Sorel, A Taste of Peace

“Human lives seldom conform to the conventions of fiction. Chekhov says that it is in the beginnings and endings of stories that we are most tempted to lie.”
― Wallace Stegner, Crossing to Safety

“Misogynists have often reproached intellectual women for 'letting themselves go'; but they also preach to them: if you want to be our equals, stop wearing makeup and polishing your nails. This advice is absurd. Precisely because the idea of femininity is artificially defined by customs and fashion, it is imposed on every woman from the outside[...]. The individual is not free to shape the idea of femininity at will.”
― Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex