Ilayda

“But an ugly girl? Ah, child, the world is made for men. An ugly girl can never be forgiven.”
― Jennifer Donnelly, Stepsister

“Until I began to build and launch rockets, I didn't know my hometown was at war with itself over its children and that my parents were locked in a kind of bloodless combat over how my brother and I would live our lives> I didn't know that if a girl broke your heart, another girl, virtuous at least in spirit, could mend it on the same night. And I didn't know that the enthalpy decrease in a converging passage could be transformed into jet kinetic energy if a divergent passage was added. The other boys discovered their own truths when we built our rockets, but those were mine.”
― Homer Hickam

“They were not pretty, these women. Pretty did not begin to describe them.
They were shrewd. Powerful. Wily. Proud. Dangerous.
They were strong.
There were brave.
They were beautiful.”
― Jennifer Donnelly, Stepsister

“There is nothing we can do about others’ hatred. We can only keep our own hearts clean.”
― Abu Bakr al Rabeeah, Homes: A Refugee Story