“No man or woman who tries to pursue an ideal in his or her own way is without enemies.”

“Feminism is comprised of values that are important to you as a woman, not ideals arrived at by forced consensus to which you should adjust your own life.”

“The property is cursed. Death dwells here. These rivers run with the blood of those who came before you. Life may not trespass, and when it tries, it will surely be snuffed out.”

“Some decisions are hard, some are easy, but either way it's our choices that matter. Who we chose to align with. What we choose to give in to. What we choose to resist. And most of all, who we choose to be. Because it is always our choice.”

“In the Blue Room, Cora Cash was trying to concentrate on her book. Cora found most novels hard to sympathise with -- all those plain governesses -- but this one had much to recommend it. The heroine was 'handsome, clever, and rich', rather like Cora herself. Cora knew she was handsome -- wasn't she always referred to in the papers as 'the divine Miss Cash'? She was clever -- she could speak three languages and could handle calculus. And as to rich, well, she was undoubtedly that. Emma Woodhouse was not rich in the way that she, Cora Cash, was rich. Emma Woodhouse did not lie on a lit à la polonaise once owned by Madame du Barry in a room which was, but for the lingering smell of paint, an exact replica of Marie Antoinette's bedchamber at le petit Trianon. Emma Woodhouse went to dances at the Assembly Rooms, not fancy dress spectaculars in specially built ballrooms. But Emma Woodhouse was motherless which meant, thought Cora, that she was handsome, clever, rich and free.”

“My life would be sour grapes and ashes without you”

“Even though I know Miranda is suppose to jam her heel—she wears leather boots with four-inch spikes in my version—into his shin, sending Caliban to the floor in a crippline mess, I don’t do that. Instead, like I’m some sort of primitive creature, an animal operating only on instinct, I whip around, lift my knee and jam it into his balls. Henry grabs his crotch and falls to the ground. He moans, the class gasps, and Ms. Peck stands motionless.”—240”