Vanessa J.

“In a typical college romance novel, this was the moment I would’ve been waiting for. The validation of all my shame and suffering at the hands of other men: a beautiful boy loved me. What had been done to my body didn’t ruin me for Mr. Right. Zippity-fucking-doo-dah.”
― Leah Raeder, Black Iris

“The clearest sign of coming catastrophe is when all the bad shit in your life suddenly stops. You’re entering the eye of the shitstorm.”
― Leah Raeder, Black Iris

“If I could fall in love with a girl, it’d be her. Those ifs are dangerous. You try them on in your head like dresses, so easy to slide in and out of. If I kissed girls, I’d kiss her. If we kissed, it’d go like this. At some point I dropped the if like a slip and just wore the feeling, nothing between it and my skin. When I kiss her. When it happens. All of it took place in my head, in silence, locked tight in skull bone and the frantic synaptic whispers between neurons, no clues popping out except the passive-aggressive haircut, the incriminating poem.

That’s the problem with writers. Too much imagination.

The greater part of me knew it couldn’t be real, but the hopeful part, which is more concentrated and condensed, rich in nine essential delusions, thought: It’s not all in your head.”
― Leah Raeder, Black Iris

“Strength is not in the body, it’s in the mind. It doesn’t lie in flexing your muscles and crushing those who oppose you. It lies in being the last one standing. By any means. At any cost.”
― Leah Raeder, Black Iris