Ann Aguirre Quotations

My life experiences are different than the average person because I've spent the last 10 years living in Mexico. I generally don't know what's going on in America, and when I do visit for work, I'm often interrogated about my life choices by random strangers.

Since becoming aware of the need to be inclusive, I've tried to make my stories broader and more representative of our world.

I am a woman. I write SF. And it's not acceptable to treat me as anything less than an equal. I won't stand for it.

My process seems to be unusual in the sense that I don't create worlds before characters. With me, character is king.

People need to believe they can make a difference - that one person standing strong can turn the tide.

People are capable of incredible gallantry and terrible cruelty in situations of extreme duress. I tried to showcase that range in 'Enclave.'

I remember when I was a kid, I could never find anything positive about chubby girls. If a girl was pudgy in books, she wasn't okay. She couldn't be happy or make friends unless she lost weight.

The people I write are real to me, and basically, they tell me about their environments on a need-to-know basis.

More than most, I know the pain of surviving.

I'll always want him. Until every sun goes dark in every sky, until I am nothing more than long-forgotten cosmic dust, I will want him. And even then I suspect my particles will long for his.

I felt like the blonde in every horror movie who hears a noise in the basement and goes to investigate alone. Sometimes you smell the stupid all around you, but you step in it anyway.

Sometimes the past needed to stay buried; it was the only way you could move on. And sometimes you had to dig it up, because that too was the only way.

If I ever win you," he said, anger bright in his pale eyes, "it will be because you want me more. Not because he's gone. I'm nobody's second best.

I’ve lost so many people. Some I left on purpose and never looked back. Some were taken from me, and I never said good-bye.

Most people can’t stomach silence; it provides too much opportunity to think about things they prefer to avoid.

My skill didn't lie in planning battles, only in fighting them.

Time is fluid, so the moments where everything feels perfect pass in a wink, and those where you're on your knees in despair drag on like the death of a thousand cuts.

Once exposed, a secret loses all its power.

You don’t know what it’s like to be alone until you’ve had someone inside your head.

We stand a professional distance apart, as if I can’t feel his pain screaming in my head. Mine amplifies his; they share a joint sound—that of glass breaking—until they swell to a crescendo that deafens.

Sometimes I miss the old me.

People try to make sense of things, and if they don’t know the answers, they make them up,because for some, a wrong answer is better than none.

We find heroes, not on battlefields, but in hospitals that tend the injured. Sometimes I think it’s easier to fight than it is to heal.

If you don't tell me what's on your mind, I can't guess

Men always want to be remembered whereas women realize that requires being dead.

I swept down the stairs to find Fade waiting for me at the bottom. His dark eyes widened, and for the first time since I'd known him, he was speechless. He stared up at me like I was everything he ever wanted.

We’re bound by chains of love, but they don’t weigh us down. Instead, they allow us to be bigger and better than we are.

How can you miss someone who’s right beside you?

While sight may deceive you, touch rarely does.

Possessiveness isn’t love. I’m not even sure it qualifies as an emotion.

It’s easy to do right when everything goes right. But let everything go wrong, and see how difficult it becomes.

There’s a hollow where he used to be, and it echoes with self-imposed loss.

Perhaps that was the point; life, if you did it right, meant learning and changing. If you didn't, you died- or stopped growing - which amounted to more or less the same thing. So I would slide in and out of different roles until I discovered the one that fit me best. -Deuce, (183)

My heart raced. He needs you, I thought. Don't let him down. I couldn't remember ever being so happy... or so scared.

A good huntress respected her partners instincts, even if he was socially ignorant.

A huntress never stabbed anything she didn't want to.

Stalkers lips curled into a sneer. "You won't make a move without him, huh? That's embarrassing." "No," I said softly. "It just hurts because you wish it was you.

If there had been another female for him since we arrived in Salvation, I needed to cut off all her hair and beat her half to death. The strength of that impulse scared me, and I took a step back. Deuce the girl was every bit as vicious as the Huntress, it seemed

Finally, I understood what else was going on. I might be slow, but given time, I put the pieces together. "You have no reason to be jealous, I promise. We talked... and trained. You're the only boy who gets close like this." "Oh." A long, slow breath escaped him. "I feel so stupid." I put my lips to his cheek and whispered, "Don't. I love you, Fade.

I know you have bad news,” I say softly. “I’m ready for it.” But that’s not true. One is never ready. You just lie and say you are and hope you can take the hit on the chin without going down.

I'm not sick, Deuce. You don't know your own charm." My charm? I hadn't been aware I had any. It must be the dress, I thought.

He has to take me as I am, broken bits and all.

A divided heart offers a strange sensation.

Sometimes it felt as if all happiness came at a price. You could never, ever, have perfection. Life gave you beauty so you could bear the pain.

People stay together and stay true only as long as they both want to. And all the promises in the world don’t change the length of time. Nothing comes with a guarantee.

His lashes, fluttered like butterfly wings. "I could've made you happy, dove." "You did," I whispered

With a polite smile, I decided she was insane.

It's only a sure defeat when you stop trying.

This is the way we win over our enemies, not with bigger weapons, or faster ships, but with human courage, ingenuity, and sacrifice. Don't lose hope. We've faced the darkness before-it has nothing new to teach us. As we go about our lives, let us remember the example Dr. Navarro set for us. At the right time, anyone can be a hero.

Not just when its easy. All the time.

They say funerals are not for the dead but for the living. Those rites are what permit you to move on, so if you don't deal with the remains, you can never deal with the memories. That might be true; we may have walked in their dust down on Venice Minor, but it's not the same as a proper good-bye.

For peace to take hold, one person must first stop fighting.

Because it takes more courage to heal the world's hurts than to inflict them.

I’d never known it was possible to love as he did— with complete devotion yet devoid of promises.

You don’t need to be afraid of falling // when there’s someone around to catch you.

I never knew I had the power to hurt him, only that he possessed the power to hurt me.

But it was like a dance across a field strewn with razors, and I bled with every step I took.

I think people can be trusted to know what makes them unhappy. Maybe we don't always know what we want exactly, but we can usually say what we don't with a fair amount of specificity.

I want to drag you off and hide you away,” he whispered. “Why?” “I always knew you were beautiful, but now everyone else will too. I won’t be able to keep other boys away from you, and it’ll make me crazy.

Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be shelter for the other. Now you will feel no cold, for each of you will be warmth for the other. Now there will be no loneliness, for each of you will be companion to the other. Now you are two persons, but there are three lives before you: His life, Her Life, and Your life together.

Like most, I was a mix of good and bad, anger and protectiveness, kindness and pride. But right now, I had only strangled fear and the promise of revenge.

Beyond, the unknown lay before us once more, and another impossible task. The four of us emerged from the earth and turned our steps west, toward the last hope for Salvation.

Don't worry he tells me tenderly. It doesn't matter who you've been, who you are, or who you become. I'm with you every step of the way.

He's earned a lifetime of peace and happiness, but some people never get what they deserve. That's why there are saints in gutters and sadists in palaces.

It’s what you do that counts, not what you consider doing.

I think my head's a minefield strewn with triggers, and maybe if I survive each explosion, what emerges from the wreckage will be me, really, truly me.

Before he bent his head, I knew what he was going to do. Touch his lips to mine. Oh, and I wanted him to... I stilled, hardly daring to breathe. The old refrain of cant and shouldn't sank beneath the weight of new worlds like please and yes.

But the world moves on, even when you don't want it to, even when change feels like the end of everything. It never stops.

He was the heat of a fire and the sweetness of the moon I'd only just met.

This is not a love story. It is my life, and as such, there is love, loss, war, death, and sacrifice. It's about things that needed to be done and choices made. I regret nothing.

Brown bird welcomes white wave. Wander no more, dear traveler.

The whole world is like Whitewall's razors I burst out. It cuts us, and we bleed but there's no purpose to it.

Love sounded terrible if it made you so weak, you couldn't survive with out it.

My body was a machine, plain and simple. I worked it to stay strong; I fed it to keep it running.

I found it curious that people kept animals for companionship and not food. When I'd asked Mama Oaks when she planned to cook the fat creature that slept in a basket in the kitchen, her eyes almost popped out of her head. Since then, she'd kept her pet away from me, like she suspected I meant to turn it into stew. Clearly, I had a lot to learn.

If so, I couldn't imagine how the opposite gender managed to get out of bed in the morning. They might be lovely to look at, but clear thinking wasn't their strong point.

I so enjoy it when people assume I'm stupid." "Not that, just very focused on killing.

I sighed. 'It's hard. You're the only one who listens to what I have to say.' Longshot dropped a gentle, comforting arm around my shoulders. 'Then speak louder, girl. Don't let them put out your spark.

Every army has a beginning, no matter how humble.

Don’t let them see you weak.

Because I love you.' It was easy to say it this time now that I understood what it meant. Then I quoted his own words back to him. 'Not just when it's easy. All the time.

People grew lazy. They knew too many blessings, and so lost the ability to appreciate what they had

Beautiful. And ugly. The world is always both.

But courage wasn't an absence of fear; it was fighting despite the knot in your stomach.

With my partner beside me, I fear nothing, not even death.

You can live without me." "I don't want to." I feared a love like this - that made us incomplete without each other. It was beautiful but treacherous, like snow that looked white and pure and lovely from the safety of your window, but when you stepped out to touch the softness, the cold first stole your breath, and then your will to move, until you could just lay down in it and let the numbness take you. yet I didn't want to be without him either, so I didn't chide him for the statement.

Sometimes I could almost hate you because you don't understand how much you mean to me, how dark and empty I was before. Solnyshko moyo.

I couldn't help what I'd done before I learned it was wrong. I could only do better in the future.

What was the good of having such a fine home if you weren't willing to fight for it?

Then in the interest of full honesty, I really wish you'd kiss me right now.

Caring too much could be dangerous; I saw that now. But the alternative was no better.

In the enclave, the strong and the physically perfect survived, but if you were strong, you protected the weak until they had an opportunity to grow into their own power.

Did he die well?" No, I thought. Nobody did. They just died.

If this is the last time, let me say it so you never forget. I will always love you, Deuce. No matter where souls go, mine will be looking for you, solnyshko moyo." "No. I want a promise instead. Promise you'll fight like you never have, so when the dying stops, you'll be on your feet looking for me here." "I swear.

Each time Stalker called you 'dove', I wanted to hit him. Because you're not a little gray bird... you're all the light in the world.

But wishes were empty thoughts, cast down a dark hole. They didn't come true unless you worked for them. I'd learned that about the world, if nothing more.

I have had passionate kisses and fierce ones, kisses so sweet they tasted like pure honey and kisses that cut like knives, but until this moment, I’ve never had one that said both hello and good-bye.

I’m not a woman you bring home to Mother, pick out china patterns with, or Mary forefend, breed. I’ve seen a chunk of the universe, true, but there’s still so much more to see. I doubt I’ll ever cure this wanderlust, and I’m content with dedicating my life to failing to sate it... He’s never going to sit at my feet and write me poems, which is good because I hate poetry, except dirty ones that rhyme.

Through the damp fabric of my coverall, bundled in my blanket, I feel naked. Raw. He sees more than I want, more than I can bear. It’s like standing before him ... while he stares at my scars, pitiless and unmoved.

Sometimes you find your heroes in the unlikeliest places.