Quotes by Alice Hoffman

“Among men and women, those in love do not always announce themselves with declarations and vows. But they are the ones who weep when youre gone. Who miss you every single night, especially when the sky is so deep and beautiful, and the ground so very cold.”

“Im thinking of reading something by chef Paul Prudhomme. Its a reading of all kinds of Southern literature.”

“Were helping the survivors of Katrina, having our voices heard, and its a great way to take back Sept. 11.”

There are some things, after all, that Sally Owens knows for certain: Always throw spilled salt over your left shoulder. Keep rosemary by your garden gate. Add pepper to your mashed potatoes. Plant roses and lavender, for luck. Fall in love whenever you can.

Do you ever just put your arms out and just spin and spin and spin? Well, thats what love is like; everything inside of you tells you to stop before you fall, but for some reason you just keep going.

When all is said and done, the weather and love are the two elements about which one can never be sure.

When I walk, I walk with you. Where I go, youre with me always.

...he had a way of taking your hand which made it clear hed have to be the one to let go.From Alice Hoffmans Local Girls, pg.102.

Sometimes the right thing feels all wrong until it is over and done with.

If every life is a river, then its little wonder that we do not even notice the changes that occur until we are far out in the darkest sea. One day you look around and nothing is familiar, not even your own face. My name once meant daughter, grandaughter, friend, sister, beloved. Now those words mean only what their letters spell out; Star in the night sky. Truth in the darkness.I have crossed over to a place where I never thought Id be. I am someone I would have never imagined. A secret. A dream. I am this, body and soul. Burn me. Drown me. Tell me lies. I will still be who I am.

Unrequited love is so boring. Weeping under a blue-black sky is for suckers or maniacs.

Still anyone who trusts a serpent deserves its bite. The wise see a creature for what it is, not what it says it may be.

My mother was teaching me that the inside of something was not necessarily its outside. Always look carefully, she told me. Look with more than your eyes.

But what we are given is taken as well, so that we know Gods glory comes to us from His will alone.

She knew it the way people say they know they are about to be hit by lightning, yet remain powerless to run, unable to avoid their fate. She panicked, as anyone might have when disparate parts of her life were about to crash into each other, certain to leave a path of anguish and debris. It was true that devotion could be lost as quickly as it was found, which was why some people insisted that love letters be written in ink. How easy it was for even the sweetest words to evaporate, only to be rewritten as impulse and infatuation might dictate. How unfortunate that love could not be taught or trained, like a seal or a dog. Instead it was a wolf on the prowl, with a mind of its own, and it made its own way, undeterred by the damage done. Love like this could turn honest people into liars and cheats, as it now did…

We are only an instant, thats true. But we are eternal.

But in battle you cannot tell another when it is his time to enter the World-to-Come, nor is it possible to keep any man in this world when he wishes to leave it behind.

You can get addicted to trouble if youre not careful.

I wrote to find beauty and purpose, to know that love is possible and lasting and real, to see day lilies and swimming pools, loyalty and devotion, even though my eyes were closed, and all that surrounded me was a darkened room. I wrote because that was who I was at the core, and if I was too damaged to walk around the block, I was lucky all the same. Once I got to my desk, once I started writing, I still believed anything was possible.

Pride is a funny thing it can make what is truly worthless appear to be a treasure.