Ciara

“It was her first time kissing a white person, and briefly, she wondered why he didn’t have any lips.”
― Akwaeke Emezi, Freshwater

“But for a society buit on exploitation, there is no greater threat than having no one left to oppress.”
― N.K. Jemisin, The Stone Sky

“As later Priam comes secretly to the enemy camp to plead with Achilles for the return of his son Hector's body, he says: "'I do what no man before me has ever done, I kiss the hands of the man who killed my son."
Those words echoed round me, as I stood in the storage hut, surrounded on all sides by the wealth Achilles had plundered from burning cities. I thought: "And I do what countless women before me have been forced to do. I spread my legs for the man who killed my husband and my brothers.”
― Pat Barker, The Silence of the Girls

“When you understand what the world is, you have two choices: Become a part of that world and perpetuate that system forever and ever, unto the next generation. Or fight it, and break it, and build something new. The former is safer, and easier. The latter is scarier, because who is to say what you build will be any better?”
― Kameron Hurley, The Stars Are Legion