Alice Hoffman Quotes

My darling girl, when are you going to realize that being normal is not necessarily a virtue? It rather denotes a lack of courage." - Aunt Frances

Others said May was best, that sweet green time when lilacs bloomed and gardens along Main Street were filled with sugary pink peonies and Dutch tulips.

It was a great escape for me and it was a way to take a break from what was going on in my own world, to go into another world.

Be careful what you wish for. I know that for a fact. Wishes are brutal, unforgiving things. They burn your tongue the moment they're spoken and you can never take them back.

I wonder how a lioness will manage in a dovecote. Can you put away your teeth and claws?

The weak are cruel. The strong have no need to be.

Once you know some things, you can't unknow them. It's a burden that can never be given away.

This was what it meant to be human, to know that time moved and all things changed.

The evening had turned sweet and blue.

No one knows you like a person with whom you've shared a childhood. No one will ever understand you in quite the same way.

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.

Books may well be the only true magic.

Sometimes, running away means you're headed in the exact right direction.

I'm at the point where going forward is easier than going back.

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

How could I have been so stupid to ignore everything I’d had in my life? The color red alone was worth kingdoms.

When I walk, I walk with you. Where I go, you're with me always.

All the characters in my books are imagined, but all have a bit of who I am in them - much like the characters in your dreams are all formed by who you are

At midnight the wind in the tress can sound like the ocean. The moonlight can make a road appear as endless as the sea.

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

When you start writing the magic comes when the characters seem to take on a life of their own and write the words for themselves.

Some fates are guaranteed, no matter who tries to intervene.

Some things, when they change, never do return to the way they once were. Butterflies for instance, and women who've been in love with the wrong man too often.

Every problem has a solution, although it may not be the outcome that was originally hoped for or expected.

I never even believed in happiness. I didn't think it existed. Now look at me. I'm ready to believe in just about anything.

People want to ignore what they can't understand. They're looking for logic at any cost.

Real love, after all, was worth the price you paid, however briefly it might last.

He has the ability to catch someone by the way that he looks at her, and make her wish he would go on looking.

I feel as if when you love a book it becomes a part of you whether you have it on your shelves or not.

Outside, the September air was enticingly fragrant, yellow with pollen and rich, lemony sunlight.

I wrote to find beauty and purpose, to know that love is possible and lasting and real.... Once I got to my desk, once I started writing, I still believed anything was possible.

I really feel like the gift is also the curse. It's always half-and-half. Whatever brings you the most joy will also probably bring you the most pain. Always a price to pay

Some people say, 'Save yourself and you save your ways.' I say, 'Be yourself and you save your soul.

Hawthorne has given us a tradition that some people refer to as Yankee Magic Realism, and I do think there is a certain quality to the landscape that definitely leads into the dark woods.

You can be betrayed in your sleep. The whole world can tilt while you're dreaming of butterflies.

She didn't like being twelve. It felt like someplace between who she'd been and who she was about to be. It felt like no place at all.

In losing a friend, she is reminded of all she has lost and all she stands to lose again. There is nothing to be done to make it any easier. We all grieve alone.

The sky is already purple; the first few stars have appeared, suddenly, as if someone had thrown a handful of silver across the edge of the world.

Anyway, the sort of love that will not wait is probably best to pass by

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

I always quit at three when my kids come home from school so I feel pretty spoiled

I always felt and still feel that fairy tales have an emotional truth that is so deep that there are few things that really rival them

I think growing up is difficult and it's a process that I'm always interested in, with kids and adults, they are often on two different universes.

I wasn't good company, that was true, and people avoided me, but that was all right. I was too busy dreaming.

I dream of a love that even time will lie down and be still for.

It doesn't matter what people tell you. It doesn't matter what they might say. Sometimes you have to leave home. Sometimes, running away means you're headed in the exact right direction.

I wasn't quite as certain that I knew her soul. When it came right down to it, I wasn't sure she knew me either.

Every time I finish a book, I forget everything I learned writing it - the information just disappears out of my head

Perhaps it is possible to discover more in silence than in speech. Or perhaps it is only that those who are silent among us learn to listen.

Even as a small child, I understood that woman had secrets, and that some of these were only to be told to daughters. In this way we were bound together for eternity.