Alya

“A bullet is alone, and man is alone; a bullet flies wherever it likes, and fate twists a man however it likes.”
― Svetlana Alexievich, The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II

“Everything I had worked for, all my years of study, had been to purchase for myself this one privilege: to see and experience more truths than those given to me by my father, and to use those truths to construct my own mind. I had come to believe that the ability to evaluate many ideas, many histories, many points of view, was at the heart of what it means to self-create. If I yielded now, I would lose more than an argument. I would lose custody of my own mind. This was the price I was being asked to pay, I understood that now. What my father wanted to cast from me wasn’t a demon: it was me.”
― Tara Westover, Educated

“Remember that you are a wolf. And you cannot be caged.”
― Sarah J. Maas, A Court of Wings and Ruin

“My life was narrated for me by others. Their voices were forceful, emphatic, absolute. It had never occurred to me that my voice might be as strong as theirs.”
― Tara Westover, Educated