Jamile Hamideh

“Trauma isn’t just the sadness that comes from being beaten, or neglected, or insulted. That’s just one layer of it. Trauma also is mourning the childhood you could have had. The childhood other kids around you had. The fact that you could have had a mom who hugged and kissed you when you skinned your knee. Or a dad who stayed and brought you a bouquet of flowers at your graduation. Trauma is mourning the fact that, as an adult, you have to parent yourself. You have to stand in your kitchen, starving, near tears, next to a burnt chicken, and you can’t call your mom to tell her about it, to listen to her tell you that it’s okay, to ask if you can come over for some of her cooking. Instead, you have to pull up your bootstraps and solve the painful puzzle of your life by yourself. What other choice do you have? Nobody else is going to solve it for you.”
― Stephanie Foo, What My Bones Know: A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma

“... It's perfect! Locke would appreciate it."

"Bug," Calo said, "Locke is our brother and our love for him knows no bounds. But the four most fatal words in the Therin language are 'Locke would appreciate it.'"

"Rivalled only by 'Locke taught me a new trick,'" added Galo.

"The only person who gets away with Locke Lamora games ..."

"... is Locke ..."

"... because we think the gods are saving him up for a really big death. Something with knives and hot irons ..."

"... and fifty thousand cheering spectators.”
― Scott Lynch, The Lies of Locke Lamora

“You’ll pardon me,” he finally said, “if the suggestion that the minuscule black turnip you call a heart is suddenly overflowing with generosity toward me leaves me wanting to arm myself and put my back against a wall.”
― Scott Lynch, The Lies of Locke Lamora

“You're one third bad intentions, one third pure avarice, and one eighth sawdust. What's left, I'll credit, must be brains.”
― Scott Lynch, The Lies of Locke Lamora