Could You Repeat That? CLXI

Final Girls, Mira Grant
"What took you so long?" she asks, and that's that: the compact is sealed. The story is begun.

The Night Ocean, Paul La Farge
I didn't tell Howard my story, because I didn't think I had to. I thought he was telling it, too.

Catwoman (Volume 6): Keeper of the Castle, Genevieve Valentine
BATMAN: And you are?
EIKO: ...Catwoman?

The Raven Boys, Maggie Stiefvater
Sometimes, Gansey felt like his life was made up of a dozen hours that he could never forget.

Catwoman (Volume 7): Inheritance, Genevieve Valentine
OSWALD: Terrifying, losing someone you didn't know you needed. You never feel again like you really know yourself. You fight that terror forever. People like your cousin...it makes them wiser. The rest of us just become monsters.

Ash, Malinda Lo
She slept on the earth over her mother's grave, and she did not dream.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, George RR Martin
"Rob me and run off, and I'll hunt you down, I swear I will. With dogs."
"You don't have any dogs," Egg pointed out.
"I'll get some," said Dunk.

Black Powder War x2, Naomi Novik
She shook out her ruff and leaning forward said softly, "I will see you bereft of all that you have, of home and happiness and beautiful things. I will see your nation cast down and your allies drawn away. I will see you as alone and friendless and wretched as am I; and then you may live as long as you like, in some dark and lonely corner of the earth, and I will call myself content."

The Nameless City (Volume 2): The Stone Heart, Faith Erin Hicks
ANDREN: You should have destroyed the book.
JOAH: It's our job to preserve and protect the knowledge of the city. It's what the monastery is for....was for.

Arabella of Mars, David D Levine
But at the last moment she sidestepped and twisted away from his thrust, just as Khema had taught her, and he sailed past her.
Past her and over the edge, his eyes shining with hatred all the while.

The Dream Thieves, Maggie Stiefvater
Then there was the awkward moment that arrives when two thirds of the people in the room know that the other third is supposed to die in fewer than nine months, and the person who is meant to die is not one of those in the know.

Empire of Ivory x2, Naomi Novik
Strategy, strategy, would call it a victory to see the Chinese aerial legions decimated: without them, the Chinese infantry and cavalry could hardly stand against British artillery. The distant corners of India brought under control, Japan humbled; perhaps a sick beast might be delivered to the Inca, and the fabled cities of gold flung open at last.
"I am sure they will find a prettier name for it, in the history books," Jane said.

Blue Lily, Lily Blue, Maggie Stiefvater
"What a cunning weapon you are. A poet is how I ended up in that cave."
"Is it a good story?" the Gray Man asked.
"Oh, it is the finest."
Blue watched the exchange with a bit of awe. Somewhere there was a lesson in this.

The Raven King, Maggie Stiefvater
They sat like that for a few minutes, as Ronan examined the car and turned each wheel to play a different tune. Adam watched how intently Ronan studied the seams, his eyelashes low over his light eyes. Ronan let out a breath, put the model down on the bed beside him, and kissed Adam.

Everfair, Nisi Shawl
"You are the problem."
"I?" Daisy looked around. Her guards had retreated to the door to the steps. Several bees detached themselves from their clumps and flew lazily toward her.
"You. Sit with me and we'll figure out how to solve you."

Down Among the Sticks and Bones, Seanan McGuire
In a place like this, under a sky like this, torches and pitchforks are the native trappings of the enraged. They appear without being asked for, and the more there are, the deeper the danger.

The Collapsing Empire, John Scalzi
"This motherfucker," Kiva said. "I want to space him just on principle."

The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl (Volume 1): Squirrel Power, Ryan North
NANCY: Hey! Hey, um, robber guy! Yeah, you, the guy robbing a bank wearing an actual domino mask. Maybe you can answer this question for me: Who does that anymore? Seriously, you look like a mime doing Zorro cosplay.

Heroine Addiction, Jennifer Matarese
With a subtle touch of his fingers to the brim of his hat and a gentle tilt of his head, Morris leaves me alone with my thoughts and my coffee pots and my abandoned past catching up to me like a gathering avalanche.

The Dispatcher, John Scalzi
"I don't pretend to understand the mechanics at play, except to acknowledge they seem supernatural, and that I understand why people see the hand of God at work. But it seems to me that if I wanted proof of God, or if God wanted to prove to us he or she was out there, bringing back murdered people wouldn't be the way to show it."
"No? How would God do it, then?"
"God would make humans stop wanting to murder each other in the first place. Sir."

Binti: Home, Nnedi Okorafor
How different my life would have been if my parents had just let me dance.

Victory of Eagles x2, Naomi Novik
"Good God," Laurence said, comprehensively; he could well and vividly imagine the reaction which the Lords of the Admiralty should have, to the intelligence that the well-formed orderly militia which they confidently expected, with a clever young officer at its head, was rather an experimental and wholly independent legion of unharnessed dragons, without great sympathy for their Lordships, and under the particular command of the most recalcitrant dragon in all Britain.

All Systems Red, Martha Wells
I hate having emotions about reality; I'd much rather have them about Sanctuary Moon.

Notes on the Assemblage (poetry), Juan Felipe Herrera
it follows you passes you dissolves ahead of you where
it is waiting for you when you get there you will not
know it until you see that it is seeing you seeing you

Life on Mars (poetry), Tracy K Smith
The first few pictures came back blurred, and I felt ashamed
For all the cheerful engineers, my father and his tribe. The second time,
The optics jibed. We saw to the edge of all there is--

So brutal and alive it seemed to comprehend us back.

Unlocked: An Oral History of Haden's Syndrome, John Scalzi
The irony of a meeting of epidemiologists being ground zero for a highly virulent new form of flu was not lost on me, or anyone else, for that matter, once the news got out.

A Separation, Katie Kitamura
In the end, what is a relationship but two people, and between two people there will always be room for surprises and misapprehensions, things that cannot be explained. Perhaps another way of putting it is that between two people, there will always be room for failures of imagination.

Lock In, John Scalzi
"Making people change because you can't deal with who they are isn't how it's supposed to be done. What needs to be done is for people to pull their heads out of their asses. You say 'cure.' I hear 'you're not human enough.'"