“Cleaning requires an attention to detail and a concern for the superficial that women are both pressured to internalize and then despised for possessing.”

“As indicated by the increase in maternal mortality in 2010, right now it's more dangerous to give birth in California than in Kuwait or Bosnia. Amnesty International reports that women in [the United States] have a higher risk of dying due to pregnancy complications than women in forty-nine other countries (black women are almost four times as likely to die as white women). The United States spends more than any other country on maternal health care, yet our risk of dying or coming close to death during pregnancy or in childbirth remains unreasonably high.”

“When women's sexuality is imagined to be passive or "dirty," it also means that men's sexuality is automatically positioned as aggressive and right-no matter what form it takes. And when one of the conditions of masculinity, a concept that is already so fragile in men's minds, is that men dissociate from women and prove their manliness through aggression, we're encouraging a culture of violence and sexuality that's detrimental to both men and women.”

“Griffin stared at me, his expression grave. "There are only three things both light and dark exiles have in common. They despise each other, they hate grigori, and they place no value on the casualties of their brutal wars."Excellent news. Not only was I apparently some weird angel-human combo, but I already had myself a badass immortal enemy.”

“What’s the difference between venerating women for being fuckable and putting them on a purity pedestal? In both cases, women’s worth is contingent upon their ability to please men and to shape their sexual identities around what men want.”

“One of my challenges [as a writer] is to make sure that I'm giving the reader details that the character cares about rather than details that I care about. I#d say that's key to world-building.”

“Liar's such a strong word. I prefer to think of it as me omitting some of the details" - Alex”