John

“You see, the hate they give is senseless. They already got power. Yet they hate those over who they got control, who don’t really pose a threat to them. Their fears aren’t real—just insecurities and inadequacies. Deep down they know that. Makes their hate like … watered-down whiskey. Now your people!”
― P. Djèlí Clark, Ring Shout

“Reason and law don’t mean much when white folk want their way.”
― P. Djèlí Clark, Ring Shout

“Power to protect. Power to avenge. Power over the life and death of my people. When colored folk ever had anyone offer us so much? When we ever had the power not to be scared no more? Ain’t we been suffering and dying all this time, at the hands of monsters in human form? What difference then if we make a pact with some other monsters? What we owe this world that so despises and brutalizes us? Why lift a hand to save it when it ain’t never done a damn thing to save us?”
― P. Djèlí Clark, Ring Shout

“It’s hard to become an adult in the place where you grew up. Because you can never escape who you were.”
― Benjamin Percy, The Ninth Metal