Badass Heart

“A library is a good place to soften solitude; a place where you feel part of a conversation that has gone on for hundreds and hundreds of years even when you’re all alone.”
― Susan Orlean, The Library Book

“The library is a prerequisite to let citizens make use of their right to information and freedom of speech. Free access to information is necessary in a democratic society, for open debate and creation of public opinion.”
― Susan Orlean, The Library Book

“Public libraries in the United States outnumber McDonald’s; they outnumber retail bookstores two to one.”
― Susan Orlean, The Library Book

“I loved wandering around the bookshelves, scanning the spines until something happened to catch my eye. Those visits were dreamy, frictionless interludes that promised I would leave richer than I arrived. It wasn't like going to a store with my mom, which guaranteed a tug-of-war between what I wanted and what my mother was willing to buy me; in the library I could have anything I wanted.”
― Susan Orlean, The Library Book