“ Throughout my college years, I'd watch my sister squeal every Christmas as she unwrapped another 'Buffy' DVD set. I didn't know much about the series, but I was filled with that obnoxious self-importa… Marie Rutkoski
“ Whether we think of Disney's blonde beauty and her pumpkin carriage or Marissa Meyer's recent recasting of 'Cinderella' as a cyborg in the young adult novel 'Cinder,' we know that there are countless… Marie Rutkoski
“ Of course having a baby derails the writing process for some time. And I will be the first to say that I have essentially no social life, because there's just nothing left after being a mom, professor… Marie Rutkoski
“ Where are we going? Arin stared out the carriage window at the trees of the Garden District, their bare branches slim and violet in the dusk.Kestrel fidgeted with her skirts. Arin. You know that we ar… Marie Rutkoski
“ A singer who refused to sing, a friend who wasn't her friend, someone who was hers and yet would never be hers. Kestrel looked away from Arin. She swore to herself that she would never look back Marie Rutkoski
“ She'd betrayed her country because she'd believed it was the right thing to do. Yet would she have done this, if not for Arin?He knew none of it. Had never asked for it. Kestrel had made her own choic… Marie Rutkoski
“ The sky was a feather blanket of clouds, save for one blue hole in the fabric. A blue cloud in a white sky. Marie Rutkoski
“ She focused on that nothingness, imagined it as ink spilling over everything she could possibly think or feel. Marie Rutkoski
“ Her innocence was maddening. She should know. She should know what her steward had done. She should know it to be her fault whether she’d given the order or not–and whether she knew or not. Innocent?… Marie Rutkoski
“ The guard hit Kestrel across the face. “I said, what did you give him?”You had a warrior’s heart, even then.Kestrel spat blood. “Nothing,” she told the guard. She thought of her father, she thought of… Marie Rutkoski
“ Kestrel's cruel calculation appalled her. This was part of what had made her resist the military: the fact that she could make decisions like this, that she did have a mind for strategy, that people c… Marie Rutkoski
“ You can't see both sides of one coin at once, can you, child? The god of money always keeps a secret.The god of money was also the god of spies. Marie Rutkoski
“ Ultimately, when he held your treasonous letter in his hand and saw how you had lied to him, the choice between me and you was the choice between someone who loves him and someone who didn't. Marie Rutkoski
“ His dear face, dear to her, dearer still. how could she love his face more for its damage? What kind of person saw someone's suffering and felt her heart crack open even wider, even more sweetly than… Marie Rutkoski
“ Kestrel's eyes slipped shut. She faded in and out of sleep. When Arin spoke again, she wasn't sure whether he expected her to to hear him.'I remember sitting with my mother in a carriage.' There was a… Marie Rutkoski
