Already, Seattle is taking hold of her. She still holds Sedna in the dry tan of her skin and in her hair, but the fine mist of the Northwest is making its way to places she didn’t know were parched.

— Susan Wiggs

At the center of every fairy tale lay a truth that gave the story its power.

— Susan Wiggs

Even the most egregious captive state, bound and gagged on her damp bunk, felt eerily familiar to her. With nothing to do but lie there and think of things, she reflected that captivity took many different forms. A woman under the domination of her father or husband was as much a prisoner as a hostage on a boat. She had merely traded one form of servitude for another.

— Susan Wiggs

Fear and love were sometimes the same thing both necessary unavoidable. Now she understood that it was okay to bleed if you know how to heal.

— Susan Wiggs

He could not name precisely the special quality she possessed. A glow. An exuberance. An aggressive and determined joy that gave her the courage to push past his defenses, to confront him with unflinching courage, to look into his heart and to see something there worth fighting for.

— Susan Wiggs

Her name was a silent song on his lips. Her love was like a circle in the water, radiating ever outward, inevitably encompassing even the remotest of hearts.

— Susan Wiggs

If I'm all alone, then the standard for sanity is up to me entirely.

— Susan Wiggs

Insults sting but a little when they stem from a man's ignorance.

— Susan Wiggs

I see the way he looks at you when you're not aware of his gaze. I see the way you care for him. And so when you think he wants you gone, it is not that. He is simply afraid to lose you.

— Susan Wiggs

It isn’t fair, but maybe that’s the whole point. Fairness has no part in real life, and she took that lesson away from the Hotel Angeline with her.

— Susan Wiggs