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“No matter how thoroughly Lan Wangji was praised as an unrivaled rare beauty, nothing could help the fact they he looked profoundly embittered, as if he had lost his wife.”
― Mò Xiāng Tóng Xiù, Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi (Novel) Vol. 1

“Perfect. Imperfect. A pair of adjectives that come over and again, in all seasons, day in and day out, taunting us, judging us, isolating us, turning our isolation into illness. Is there a more accomplished adjective than perfect? Perfect is free from comparison, perfect rejects superlative. We can always be good, do better, try our best, but how perfect can we be before we can love ourselves and let others love us? And who, my dear child, has taken the word lovable out of your dictionary and mine, and replaced it with perfect?”
― Yiyun Li, Where Reasons End

“Hers was tougher than tough love. It was brutal, industrial-strength. A sinewy love that never gave way to an inch of weakness. It was a love that saw what was best for you ten steps ahead, and didn't care if it hurt like hell in the meantime. When I got hurt, she felt it so deeply, it was as though it were her own affliction. She was guilty only of caring too much. I realize this now, only in retrospect. No one in this would would ever love me as much as my mother, and she would never let me forget it.”
― Michelle Zauner, Crying in H Mart

“Upon this ancient desert, only the two of them remained. With a muffled thump, the gun fell to the ground. Lu Feng closed his eyes and held An Zhe tightly in his arms.”
― Shisi, Little Mushroom: Revelations