Emma Hartman

“Perfect, he, as a lover, might have called them off-hand. But no—they were not perfect. and it was the touch of the imperfect upon the would-be perfect that gave the sweetness, because it was that which gave the humanity.”
― Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D’Urbervilles

“But there is nothing that makes its way more directly to the Soul than Beauty, which immediately diffuses a secret satisfaction and complacency through the imagination, and gives a finishing to any thing that is Great or Uncommon.”
― Joseph Addison, The Spectator: Volumes I, II, and III

“Without me, that girl will be gone. Gone-gone. You understand? Gone, baby, gone,' he sang.”
― Dennis Lehane, Gone, Baby, Gone

“You’ve mislaid your trust in the past, had your faith in people broken, shattered even. You’ve been betrayed. Lied to. So you’ve chosen not to trust. And this protects you to some extent, I’m sure. But it also isolates you from the rest of humanity. You are disconnected. You are displaced. And the only way to find your way back to a place, to a connection, is to trust again.”
― Dennis Lehane, Sacred