It would have been funny if I had been an observer and not a participant, an idea that gave me a disconcerting insight into gossip. As I walked beside the silent Tamara, I realized that despite how entertaining certain stories were, at the bottom of every item of gossip there was someone getting hurt.

— Sherwood Smith

I've been working hard at assuming Court polish, but the more I learn about what really goes on behind the pretty voices and waving fans and graceful bows, the more I comprehend that what is really said matters little, so long as the manner in which it is said pleases. I understand it, but I don't like it. Were I truly influential, then I would halt this foolishness that decrees that in Court one cannot be sick; that to admit you are sick is really to admit to political or social or romantic defeat; that to admit to any emotions usually means one really feels the opposite. It is a terrible kind of falsehood that people can only claim feelings as a kind of social weapon.

— Sherwood Smith

Memory warps time, as it does the sights and sounds and smells of reality; for what shapes it is emotion, which can twist what seems clear, just as the surface of a pond seems to bend the stick thrust into the water.

— Sherwood Smith

No, I don't think I could fall in love with him, handsome though he is, because I don't accept any of that huff he gives me about my great beauty and all that. I'd have to trust a man's words before I could love him. I think.

— Sherwood Smith

No, my career as a warrior princess, short as it had been, was over, I thought morosely. Violence only works if you're good at it. Otherwise, it hurts too much.

— Sherwood Smith

The only noise now was the rain, pattering softly with the magnificent indifference of nature for the tangled passions of humans.

— Sherwood Smith

What if feeling good only comes after you destroy someone you hate?'' That's not good, that's triumph,

— Sherwood Smith

What's it really like to always be the prettiest person in a room? Does it mean you're always acting as if in a play, because no one stops looking at you?'' Life is a play, isn't it?

— Sherwood Smith

When in doubt, be ridiculous.

— Sherwood Smith

When I turned thirteen and took a typing class, with typical early teen enthusiasm and total lack of critical ability, I started sending my stuff to publishers once I'd babysat long enough to earn the postage.

— Sherwood Smith