The Saucy Wenches Book Club

“We are the inheritors of a wonderful world, a beautiful world, full of life and mystery, goodness and pain. But likewise are we the children of an indifferent universe. We break our own hearts imposing our moral order on what is, by nature, a wide web of chaos.” ~ Colin Meloy, Wildwood

That’s how I used poetry. To understand the world. To decode, analyze, interpret, think. Gave me a huge leg up. For instance, in my government classes the professors would ask, “But does the checks and balances system really work, because if so, how do you explain Nixon?” I knew how to explain Nixon: Dante. Adultery? James Dickey. Despair? Too long to list here. ~ Bonnie Garmus, Peck & Peck

Inside its maw, human existence, all humans and all the things humans have ever done, said, thought, or been, are rotting into sludge. U-3125 is, in large part, the lie that U-3125 is inevitable, and indestructible. But it is a lie. She feels it, now. ~ qntm (Sam Hughes), There Is No Antimemetics Division

Carl: Christ. Is the whole universe filled with assholes? Mordecai: Just the ones with the money. ~ Matt Dinniman, The Gate of the Feral Gods

Do you have any idea how much energy it takes to open an aperture in time and space, how much water it takes to keep the computing systems from frying themselves? ~ Ellery Lloyd, Time to Burn

“Poke around in murky waters, and things will rise to the surface. Truth is buoyant.” ~ Hernan Diaz, Ply

“To love a human, to fall for a human, there’s nothing like it. It’s risky, yes. But to risk is to hope, and without hope, well, we are done as a species.” He waved in the general direction of the cantina and shook his head. “A robot ... that is giving up. You’re too young to give up. I can’t let you do it.” ~ Deb Olin Unferth, Earth 7

Come the first of October, no matter the weather, day of the week, or physical condition of the cadets, so long as they have reached the age of twenty, the first-years of Basgiath War College’s Riders Quadrant walk into the forest in hopes of being chosen as a bonded rider by a dragon of the Empyrean. We call this monumental event Threshing . ~ Rebecca Yarros, Threshing Day

She let him know, in no uncertain terms, what she thought of his loyalty to a government that prioritized its own greatness over the well-being of its people — but her disapproval only fueled his. ~ Lily Brooks-Dalton, Ruins

“Friends are like oxygen. If you’ve been blessed enough to have always been surrounded by friends, you might think I’m overplaying this. I don’t blame you. If you’d always been surrounded by air, you wouldn’t think to credit it for your very existence either. But I’ve spent much of my life gasping for breath, so I promise you, it’s true. Friends are like oxygen.” ~ Sally Hepworth, Mad Mabel

So blind we humans are — so blind. To each other and to ourselves, moving through life as though through shadows, putting out a hand in the dark and thinking we have touched someone.... But mostly we travel through life unsighted, grasping only the smallest details of one another’s selves, including our own. Thinking all the while that we can see. ~ Elizabeth Strout, The Things We Never Say

“For everyone who looks around and sees only darkness, let them watch you burn and light the way” ~ Penn Cole, Burn of the Everflame

But she is learning to let others think of her what they will. She is learning to keep secrets. And in the dark soil of her silence, she is gathering bits of knowledge like seed, planting them deep. ~ Ariel Lawhon, The Pirate Queen