Emma

“A flaw of humanity,” said Parisa, shrugging. “The compulsion to be unique, which is at war with the desire to belong to a single identifiable sameness.”
― Olivie Blake, The Atlas Six

“Rowan knew he was out on a limb with Volta. The only thing to do was shimmy to its precarious end. “You only pretend to like gleaning,” he said to Volta. “But you hate it more than you’ve ever hated anything. Your mentor was Scythe Nehru, right? He’s very old-school, which means he chose you for your conscience. You don’t want to take life—and you definitely don’t want to take dozens upon dozens at a time.”
― Neal Shusterman, Scythe

“This continued for many weeks. Sometimes, la sirena would join Suma in her singing, and together, their voices would bring dreams of the sea to the people of the plantation.
It was in these moments that Suma could taste freedom. It was then that she began to know love.”
― Vita Ayala, Reclaim the Stars: 17 Tales Across Realms & Space

“It was raining again—this unrelenting rain. Without even trying, Malena heard the roaring of the growing river beneath the deafening song of the raindrops, frogs, crickets, and birds of the night. Above the trees, a bat swooped down time after time, tasting the still ripening nísperos in the trees. The medlar fruit was an immigrant like Malena's family, its ancestor brought as a seed in a ship all the way from China, and now it covered the fields as if it had been here since the beginning of the world.”
― Yamile Saied Méndez, Reclaim the Stars: 17 Tales Across Realms & Space