Sharyn McCrumb Quotes & Sayings

Machines seem to sense that I am afraid of them. It makes them hostile. — Sharyn McCrumb

Domestic rabbits don't have the sense that God promised animal crackers. — Sharyn McCrumb

All babies are incoherent, but they grow up. That is the principle difference between an infant and a poet. — Sharyn McCrumb

Life seems to be a choice between two wrong answers. — Sharyn McCrumb

A man is always a little shamefaced on his wedding day, like a fox caught in a baited trap, ensnared because his greed overcame his better judgment. The menfolk laughed at Charlie that spring day, and said he was caught for sure now. As the bride, I was praised and fussed over, as if I had won a prize or done something marvelous that no one ever did before, and I could not help feeling pleased and clever that I had managed to turn myself from an ordinary girl into a shining bride. Now I think it is a dirty lie. The man is the one who is winning the game that day, though they always pretend they are not, and the poor girl bride is led into a trap of hard work and harsh words, the ripping of childbirth and the drubbing of her man's fists. It is the end of being young, but no one tells her so. Instead they make over her, and tell her how lucky she is. I wonder do slaves get dressed up in finery on the day they are sold. — Sharyn McCrumb

I always, always wanted to be the Dungeon Master because that's where the creativity lies - in thinking up places, characters and situations. If done well, a game can be a novel in itself. — Sharyn McCrumb

Being a professional writer is a lot like being a hooker. You'd better find out if you're any good at it before you start charging for it. — Sharyn McCrumb

Oh, son, hardly anybody wants to leave. These mountains are more than just a place for folks around here. — Sharyn McCrumb

Mountains have long-lost kinfolk on the other side of the Atlantic. The bloodline that marks that kinship is a vein of a green mineral called serpentine ... — Sharyn McCrumb

Celebrity is having ten thousand friends and five really sick enemies , all of whom you have never met . WILL never meet if you're lucky . Either you accept that and resolve to live with it , or you get out of the spotlight and hope to God you left in time . Because if anybody still remembers you from one flash of fame twenty years ago , then anonymity is not an option . — Sharyn McCrumb

Elvis is bound to be dead. Look at all the vultures in his vicinity. — Sharyn McCrumb

The people who live happily ever after - they don't appear in the history books. They just fade away. I reckon that's what happiness is.
Pauline Foster - " The Ballad of Tom Dooley ", Sharyn McCrumb, p. 271 — Sharyn McCrumb

Boondocks' is simply the Tagalog word for mountains. — Sharyn McCrumb

Nobody has time to write a book. Some people just do it anyhow. — Sharyn McCrumb

Trying to act normal is the most unnatural behavior of all. — Sharyn McCrumb

Is the groom going to go where no man has gone before? — Sharyn McCrumb

There is a time in late September when the leaves are still green, and the days are still warm, but somehow you know that it is all about to end, as if summer was holding its breath, and when it let it out again, it would be autumn. — Sharyn McCrumb

Romulan or Vulcan?' the ushers asked each guest.
Marion, who had been poised to say 'friends of the bride' had responded to the question with an open-mouthed stare, and Jay Omega answered, 'Klingon! which got them seats in the back row of the Romulan side. — Sharyn McCrumb

Anger is more productive than fear. — Sharyn McCrumb

Seasons didn't come behind the nicotine-stained walls of Mountain City's prison, so Harm always imagined it spring--the locust trees clustered with shaggy white blooms, the wet woods flecked with bloodroot, and wild roses and honeysuckle flashing white among the chestnuts on the mountainsides... — Sharyn McCrumb

I wonder which is worse-the death, not knowing what comes after, or the wedding, when you think you know, but you're wrong. — Sharyn McCrumb

SHADOW KNIGHT'S MATE is a compelling story, extremely well-written and alarmingly plausible. Jay Brandon does for politics what Dan Brown did for religion. — Sharyn McCrumb

Maybe staying single meant that you never had to grow up. — Sharyn McCrumb

Cities are judged by their richest inhabitants and rural areas are judged — Sharyn McCrumb

It couldn't be the beer. Donnie McRory was certain of that. If you sent American beer out to be analyzed, the lab would probably phone up and say, 'Your horse has diabetes. — Sharyn McCrumb

You take a handful of rocks and put them in a jar. Then once a week, you take one tiny pebble out of the jar and throw it away. When the jar is empty, why, you'll just about be over your grief ... Time alone will do if you're short on rocks. — Sharyn McCrumb

High school and equality are forever incompatible. — Sharyn McCrumb

Some people are born to fit the times. — Sharyn McCrumb

If it had taught them nothing else, twenty years of living past high school had taught them self-preservation ... No one was going to risk putting his ego on the line; they would come prepared with dates, flattering clothes, and a well-rehearsed, carefully edited biography. They would all be kind to each other. High school was enough torture for one lifetime. — Sharyn McCrumb

Half magic is no magic at all. — Sharyn McCrumb

Wild steep mountains floating in a haze of cloud...a sea of green trees swallowing the hills and valleys, and curling around the trails and rivers, with the wind in the leaves as its tide. — Sharyn McCrumb

The ones that landed near the bathroom are Bad Tolkien imitations or transcripts of a D&D adventure; bad Herbert, Heinlein, and Asimov are below the television; and these on the bed are the ones whose authors I want to hunt down personally and slap. — Sharyn McCrumb