The Saucy Wenches Book Club

Those who had nothing substantial to brag about bragged the loudest. Stay silent and ignore the chattering crowd — this was proof you had something real to be proud of. ~ R.F. Kuang, Katabasis

...a strange thing happened when they stormed the dock, dicks flapping, and whooped into the lake: the beer and the drugs and the attempted sorcery of pretending to be young made them actually young. Water was the missing ingredient. It was what the spell needed. The imperfections of their bodies dissolved into the lake. They lost their beer guts and their spare tires, their shin splints and torn meniscuses, anything that made them look half-comic when they ran. They were twenty again, svelte and handsome and bombed out of their minds. ~ Eric Puchner, Dream State

“I guess there’s no bottom to a person, but I feel you have left fewer stones unturned than anyone else who’s ever passed through, and it’s taken me some time to recognize how knowing you has been like coming in from the cold, lonely road to find a warm fire and a table laid, so thank you for that....” ~ Virginia Evans, The Correspondent: A Novel

There are patches of green woods, and I am their biggest fan. I root for them out here on the plain. Go Go Go Grow Grow Grow! That’s our fight song. I yell it out the window as I fly low over. The green patches are spreading year by year. Life is tenacious if you give it one little bit of encouragement ~ Peter Heller, The Dog Stars

“Sometimes what we want to do and what we must do are not the same. The smaller the space between your desire and what is right, the happier you will be.” ~ Jess Walter, Beautiful Ruins

“Yeah, they still make duct tape. And it still holds the universe together.” ~ Dennis E. Taylor, We Are Legion (We Are Bob)

“To the child in each of us, yearning to be special. Take my hand, you strange little creature, and together we shall walk beyond the wall.” ~ Rachel Gillig, The Knight and the Moth

“I like knowing I can be of value to someone, more than just a bank account. I like knowing that I can offer my humor, my touch, my mind ... my soul. I like knowing that I’m helpful, that I can bring joy. That’s very much my love language.” ~ Meghan Quinn, Till Summer Do Us Part

All struggles Are essentially power struggles. Who will rule, Who will lead, Who will define, refine, confine, design, Who will dominate. All struggles Are essentially power struggles, And most are no more intellectual than two rams knocking their heads together. ~ Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Sower

After all, it is probable that the humans are unaware how prevalent a threat vampires and werewolves have become in modern space travel. ~ Barbara Truelove, Of Monsters and Mainframes

“Every living thing on this planet, including human beings, are products of nature, squirrel,” he said. “Humans may believe that we are in charge, but we shouldn’t be, because we can’t be trusted with that power. We need to acknowledge the things that are still wild, the things that have survived us. We need to remember that this”—he gestured at the trees around us, the falling snow, the vanished deer—“is what we are supposed to be part of. ~ Janelle Brown, What Kind of Paradise

“It might sound like an unhappy ending, but only if you forget how many times during this story we’ve told you that someone laughed. How many really good nows is that? How many people ever have more?” ~ Fredrik Backman, My Friends

“You cannot buy the Revolution. You cannot make the Revolution. You can only be the Revolution. It is in your spirit, or it is nowhere.” ~ Ursula K. Leguin, The Dispossessed

“His hand brushed a lock of her hair out of her face. “Little wren, I am a monster. A monster in a suit, but one with claws nonetheless.” “I don’t care,” she told him. “That’s what I want.” “You don’t want...” “Don’t tell me what I want. I’ll tell you what I want. I want you.” Her hand came to the tie on his suit, dragging him in closer to her. Their mouths were a hairsbreadth apart as she commanded, “Let the monster off its leash.” ~ K.A. Linde, The Wren in the Holly Library

“We went out when we weren’t supposed to, we were too free, and this—all of this—is our punishment. It has nothing to do with the idea of us becoming dogs, and everything to do with the fact of us being girls.” ~ Xenobe Purvis, The Hounding

“What is magic but science that is not yet understood? What is science but magic with an explanation?” ~ Lily Brooks-Dalton, The Light Pirate

“You have to fool yourself into thinking you already are the thing you want to become.” ~ Clare Leslie Hall, Broken Country