Rivals Series Quotes

Why I am Passionate and Dedicated 1000% to producing and bringing my books Loving Summer, Bitter Frost, and other book series to the Screen is because these are the very books that I was cyber-bullied on. When confronted by bullies, you don't shy away, but you Fight Back. Many people have not read the books, but believe fake news and damaging slanders against them and me as a person because it was a marketing strategy used to sell my books' rival books. By bringing these very books to the screen, people can see how different my books are to theirs. Also, most of all, it is pretty darn fun and fierce for me, as a female Asian writer, director, and producer to bring these fan favorite books to screen.

This “who’s on top” banter continues until one wrestler (who has slyly gone to hide behind a chair) leaps upon his rival with an animal cry. The pair then proceeds to create a series of tableaux that appear to be from the Kama Sutra, Vatsyayana's ancient Indian textbook of carnal satisfaction. Occasionally, the tension is broken by a wrestler who picks up a large object, such as a table, to throw on the other's head, as if suddenly disgusted by his forbidden love.

Few watched the human homeworld as she did, which meant there were fewer rivals for her harvests. Her predations. Reijik Station, she mused. Her fingers twitched in their plasteel cage as she wondered what manner of feast this harvest might provide.

Democratic periodicals in the North warned that the governor’s stance would compromise highly profitable New York trade connections with Virginia and other slave states. Seward was branded “a bigoted New England fanatic.” This only emboldened Seward’s resolve to press the issue. He spurred the Whig-dominated state legislature to pass a series of antislavery laws affirming the rights of black citizens against seizure by Southern agents, guaranteeing a trial by jury for any person so apprehended, and prohibiting New York police officers and jails from involvement in the apprehension of fugitive slaves.

He spurred the Whig-dominated state legislature to pass a series of antislavery laws affirming the rights of black citizens against seizure by Southern agents, guaranteeing a trial by jury for any person so apprehended, and prohibiting New York police officers and jails from involvement in the apprehension

These (Shakespeare, Milton, and Victor Hugo) not only knit and knot the logical texture of the style with all the dexterity and strength of prose; they not only fill up the pattern of the verse with infinite variety and sober wit; but they give us, besides, a rare and special pleasure, by the art, comparable to that of counterpoint, with which they follow at the same time, and now contrast, and now combine, the double pattern of the texture and the verse.  Here the sounding line concludes; a little further on, the well-knit sentence; and yet a little further, and both will reach their solution on the same ringing syllable.  The best that can be offered by the best writer of prose is to show us the development of the idea and the stylistic pattern proceed hand in hand, sometimes by an obvious and triumphant effort, sometimes with a great air of ease and nature.  The writer of verse, by virtue of conquering another difficulty, delights us with a new series of triumphs.  He follows three purposes where his rival followed only two; and the change is of precisely the same nature as that from melody to harmony. -ON SOME TECHNICAL ELEMENTS OF STYLE IN LITERATURE

There was nothing like getting your cock sucked by a dragon. Their saliva was pure ecstasy all on its own. Alessio was one of the most skilled cock suckers I’ve experienced. Still, his skill didn’t rival Donovan’s or Tylendel’s. But damn, he was fantastic! He was moaning as he sucked my cock and I knew he was savoring my precum as it leaked from my slit. I could feel his hands gripping my ass cheeks as he bobbed on my dick.

Remember? We have a rematch. And this time, it’s my turn to shine.” With his goggles on, Sterling got into his stance, keeping an eye on the Professor. “Oh? I didn’t realize that you were so dull.” I put my goggles on and took my stance as well, making sure that Professor Trinkott was within my line of vision. Challenge accepted. “Ha, ha, joke all you want, Alvara. Just don’t come crying to me afterwards.” “I don’t cry when I win.

The political process is dominated by rival elites committed to irreconcilable beliefs [...] the politics of ideology distorted our view of the world and confronted us with a series of false choices between feminism and the family, social reform and traditional values, racial justice and individual accountability. Ideological rigidity has the effect of obscuring the views Americans have in common, of replacing substantive issues with purely symbolic issues, and of creating a false impression of polarization.

It is expected of them as it is expected of those who come from the Black Syndicate. We are a feared Court, probably only rivaled by one other, but there are still areas of light there. The people of the Fire Court know what they guard and protect so valiantly and do not mind being called such things. There is still love and loyalty and laughter in the darkness if you know where to look, even if others do not believe it exists.” “When you described your home, nothing sounded dark about it.” “Because I know where to look,” he replied, the corner of his mouth turning up slightly. “And you may be a pain in my ass sometimes, but I would never call you wicked. I would never fear you,” she said.

wide open falsehood the clandestine truths rival till the end in a series of duels pardon the drapery language I choose Waltz in Vienna has taught me to use every tall room a fiction leatherbound treasure books up to the ceiling gold spine upon spine the guile and the treason the faith and allegiance wide open falsehood the clandestine truths rival till the end in a series of duels pardon the drapery language I choose the author grew fat to imagine his lead pen careening gave voice to the scheming an Aryan cabale to dethrone the guile and the treason the faith and allegiance to the empire unknown the baron and his mistress dine in a fine banquet hall as rebel insurgents plot in the attic space crawl the guile and the treason the faith and allegiance now lie in my hand

Several dozen of the non-English Wikipedias have, each, one article on Pokémon, the trading-card game, manga series, and media franchise. The English Wikipedia began with one article and then a jungle grew. There is a page for “Pokémon (disambiguation),” needed, among other reasons, in case anyone is looking for the Zbtb7 oncogene, which was called Pokemon (for POK erythroid myeloid ontogenic factor), until Nintendo’s trademark lawyers threatened to sue. There are at least five major articles about the popular-culture Pokémons, and these spawn secondary and side articles, about the Pokémon regions, items, television episodes, game tactics, and all 493 creatures, heroes, protagonists, rivals, companions, and clones, from Bulbasaur to Arceus. All are carefully researched and edited for accuracy, to ensure that they are reliable and true to the Pokémon universe, which does not actually, in some senses of the word, exist.

The moderate person contains opposing capacities to the nth degree. A moderate person can start out hot on both ends, both fervent in a capacity for rage and fervent in a desire for order, both Apollonian at work and Dionysian at play, both strong in faith and deeply doubtful, both Adam I and Adam II. A moderate person can start out with these divisions and rival tendencies, but to live a coherent life, the moderate must find a series of balances and proportions. The moderate is forever seeking a series of temporary arrangements, embedded in the specific situation of the moment, that will help him or her balance the desire for security with the desire for risk, the call of liberty with the need for restraint. The moderate knows there is no ultimate resolution to these tensions. Great matters cannot be settled by taking into account just one principle or one viewpoint. Governing is more like sailing in a storm: shift your weight one way when the boat tilts to starboard, shift your weight the other way when it tilts to port—adjust and adjust and adjust to circumstances to keep the semblance and equanimity of an even keel.

The essence of Roosevelt’s leadership, I soon became convinced, lay in his enterprising use of the “bully pulpit,” a phrase he himself coined to describe the national platform the presidency provides to shape public sentiment and mobilize action. Early in Roosevelt’s tenure, Lyman Abbott, editor of The Outlook, joined a small group of friends in the president’s library to offer advice and criticism on a draft of his upcoming message to Congress. “He had just finished a paragraph of a distinctly ethical character,” Abbott recalled, “when he suddenly stopped, swung round in his swivel chair, and said, ‘I suppose my critics will call that preaching, but I have got such a bully pulpit.’ ” From this bully pulpit, Roosevelt would focus the charge of a national movement to apply an ethical framework, through government action, to the untrammeled growth of modern America. Roosevelt understood from the outset that this task hinged upon the need to develop powerfully reciprocal relationships with members of the national press. He called them by their first names, invited them to meals, took questions during his midday shave, welcomed their company at day’s end while he signed correspondence, and designated, for the first time, a special room for them in the West Wing. He brought them aboard his private railroad car during his regular swings around the country. At every village station, he reached the hearts of the gathered crowds with homespun language, aphorisms, and direct moral appeals. Accompanying reporters then extended the reach of Roosevelt’s words in national publications. Such extraordinary rapport with the press did not stem from calculation alone. Long before and after he was president, Roosevelt was an author and historian. From an early age, he read as he breathed. He knew and revered writers, and his relationship with journalists was authentically collegial. In a sense, he was one of them. While exploring Roosevelt’s relationship with the press, I was especially drawn to the remarkably rich connections he developed with a team of journalists—including Ida Tarbell, Ray Stannard Baker, Lincoln Steffens, and William Allen White—all working at McClure’s magazine, the most influential contemporary progressive publication. The restless enthusiasm and manic energy of their publisher and editor, S. S. McClure, infused the magazine with “a spark of genius,” even as he suffered from periodic nervous breakdowns. “The story is the thing,” Sam McClure responded when asked to account for the methodology behind his publication. He wanted his writers to begin their research without preconceived notions, to carry their readers through their own process of discovery. As they educated themselves about the social and economic inequities rampant in the wake of teeming industrialization, so they educated the entire country. Together, these investigative journalists, who would later appropriate Roosevelt’s derogatory term “muckraker” as “a badge of honor,” produced a series of exposés that uncovered the invisible web of corruption linking politics to business. McClure’s formula—giving his writers the time and resources they needed to produce extended, intensively researched articles—was soon adopted by rival magazines, creating what many considered a golden age of journalism. Collectively, this generation of gifted writers ushered in a new mode of investigative reporting that provided the necessary conditions to make a genuine bully pulpit of the American presidency. “It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the progressive mind was characteristically a journalistic mind,” the historian Richard Hofstadter observed, “and that its characteristic contribution was that of the socially responsible reporter-reformer.

businesses that could benefit from the way networks behave, and this approach yielded some notable successes. Richard came from a different slant. For twenty years, he was a ‘strategy consultant’, using economic analysis to help firms become more profitable than their rivals. He ended up co-founding LEK, the fastest-growing ‘strategy boutique’ of the 1980s, with offices in the US, Europe and Asia. He also wrote books on business strategy, and in particular championed the ‘star business’ idea, which stated that the most valuable venture was nearly always a ‘star’, defined as the biggest firm in a high-growth market. In the 1990s and 2000s, Richard successfully invested the money he had made as a management consultant in a series of star ventures. He also read everything available about networks, feeling intuitively that they were another reason for business success, and might also help explain why some people’s careers took off while equally intelligent and qualified people often languished. So, there were good reasons why Greg and Richard might want to write a book together about networks. But the problem with all such ‘formal’ explanations is that they ignore the human events and coincidences that took place before that book could ever see the light of day. The most

During the 2016 US presidential campaign, the hatred shown toward Hillary Clinton far outstripped even the most virulent criticisms that could legitimately be pinned on her. She was linked with “evil” and widely compared to a witch, which is to say that she was attacked as a woman, not as a political leader. After her defeat, some of those critics dug out the song “Ding Dong, the Witch is Dead,” sung in The Wizard of Oz to celebrate the Witch of the East’s death—a jingle already revived in the UK at the time of Margaret Thatcher’s death in 2013. This reference was brandished not only by Donald Trump’s electors, but also by supporters of Bernie Sanders, Clinton’s main rival in the primaries. On Sanders’ official site, a fundraising initiative was announced under the punning title “Bern the Witch”—an announcement that the Vermont senator’s campaign team took down as soon as it was brought to his attention. Continuing this series of limp quips, the conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh quipped, “She’s a witch with a capital B”—he can’t have known that, at the Salem witch trials in the seventeenth century, a key figure had already exploited this consonance by calling his servant, Sarah Churchill, who was one of his accusers, “bitch witch.” In reaction, female Democrat voters started sporting badges calling themselves “Witches for Hillary” or “Hags for Hillary.”48

Meanwhile, he continued to speak out on behalf of black citizens. In March 1846, a terrifying massacre took place in Seward’s hometown. A twenty-three-year-old black man named William Freeman, recently released from prison after serving five years for a crime it was later determined he did not commit, entered the home of John Van Nest, a wealthy farmer and friend of Seward’s. Armed with two knives, he killed Van Nest, his pregnant wife, their small child, and Mrs. Van Nest’s mother. When he was caught within hours, Freeman immediately confessed. He exhibited no remorse and laughed uncontrollably as he spoke. The sheriff hauled him away, barely reaching the jail ahead of an enraged mob intent upon lynching him. “I trust in the mercy of God that I shall never again be a witness to such an outburst of the spirit of vengeance as I saw while they were carrying the murderer past our door,” Frances Seward told her husband, who was in Albany at the time. “Fortunately, the law triumphed.” Frances recognized at once an “incomprehensible” aspect to the entire affair, and she was correct. Investigation revealed a history of insanity in Freeman’s family. Moreover, Freeman had suffered a series of floggings in jail that had left him deaf and deranged. When the trial opened, no lawyer was willing to take Freeman’s case. The citizens of Auburn had threatened violence against any member of the bar who dared to defend the cold-blooded murderer. When the court asked, “Will anyone defend this man?” a “death-like stillness pervaded the crowded room,” until Seward rose, his voice strong with emotion, and said, “May it please the court, I shall remain counsel for the prisoner until his death!

Half a century ago, eminent psychologist Elliot Aronson conducted a series of experiments suggesting that we’re often more sensitive to gains and losses in esteem than the level of esteem itself. When someone always supports us, we take it for granted—and can discount it. But we regard someone who began as a rival and then became an enthusiastic supporter as an authentic advocate.

In many countries, including England and the United States, poor diet now rivals smoking as the greatest public health risk. Malnutrition does not necessarily mean lack of food, but rather lack of proper nutrients. You can eat five meals a day and qualify as malnourished. (Case in point: Morgan Spurlock’s near-lethal experiment in Supersize Me.) When it comes to certain nutrients, in fact, an estimated 80 to 90 percent of obese individuals are malnourished. (The same percentage holds for nonobese individuals.)

This book should never have happened. If it wasn’t for the most bizarre and twisted sequence of events involving a diverse array of people it wouldn’t have. Let us explain. If someone we, the authors, had wanted to impress - a publisher, say, or a book reviewer - had asked us how it had emerged, we could have come up with all kinds of things to establish our credentials for writing it. But they would have been only a small part of the story of how it came about, and not the interesting bit either. The truth is much more human and fascinating - and it also gets to the heart of the book and shows how networks really work. Greg has always been fascinated by ‘network theory’ - the findings of sociologists, mathematicians and physicists, which seemed to translate to the real world of links between people. Early in his professional life at Auto Trader magazine in Canada he got to see an extraordinary network of buyers and sellers in operation. Later, when he became a venture capitalist - someone who invests in new or young companies, hoping that some of them will become very valuable - he applied what he’d learned. He invested in businesses that could benefit from the way networks behave, and this approach yielded some notable successes. Richard came from a different slant. For twenty years, he was a ‘strategy consultant’, using economic analysis to help firms become more profitable than their rivals. He ended up co-founding LEK, the fastest-growing ‘strategy boutique’ of the 1980s, with offices in the US, Europe and Asia. He also wrote books on business strategy, and in particular championed the ‘star business’ idea, which stated that the most valuable venture was nearly always a ‘star’, defined as the biggest firm in a high-growth market. In the 1990s and 2000s, Richard successfully invested the money he had made as a management consultant in a series of star ventures. He also read everything available about networks, feeling intuitively that they were another reason for business success, and might also help explain why some people’s careers took off while equally intelligent and qualified people often languished. So, there were good reasons why Greg and Richard might want to write a book together about networks. But the problem with all such ‘formal’ explanations is that they ignore the human events and coincidences that took place before that book could ever see the light of day. The most

During the same time, it was faced with the first series of wars with Russia, as the new Tsar, Peter the Great implemented a new policy of “access to the sea.” This prevented the Ottoman’s Crimean allies, who usually sent cavalry reinforcements to fight alongside regular Ottoman troops, from supporting Ottoman forces in central Europe. Despite several Russian defeats, the conflict ended with the capture of Azov, the Ottoman’s stronghold in Crimea in 1696, and was a sign of the growing threat Russia posed to the Ottomans. Russia increasingly saw the Ottoman Empire as its objective rival in its quest to assert control over the Black Sea.

Enchanted objects took up most of the space—everything from tiaras that would make a person beautiful to sleeping potions strong enough to rival the one that had knocked out Briar Rose. Nix

The golden age for magazines came in the quarter-century from 1825 to 1850, when the business as we know it today really began. In 1825 there were fewer than a hundred magazines in America; by 1850 there were more than six hundred, the survivors of between four and five thousand periodicals issued in that quarter-century. Three magazines founded during this period are still surviving: Scientific American, begun in 1845, and Harper's Magazine, founded in 1850 as Harper's New Monthly Magazine. Its rival was and remains the Atlantic Monthly, established in 1857.

But her boyfriend is a friend of mine, or at least he’s a colleague who isn’t a business rival, which is what passes for friendship among the top levs.

I’d give anything to hold her every night for the rest of my life.

At least I don’t want to kill him anymore.

How else will I ever be able to show her I love her like to the depths of my soul love her? She’s my person. She always has been and I can’t—no, I won’t—let her go this time.

At this rate, I’ll be drunk before she finishes her glass of wine.

Does she seriously think I’ll follow her and ‘fuck it out’ right now?

It took you less than two minutes to flirt with another man. You won’t be sharing a dance with him or anyone else tonight. Not if I have anything to say about it.

Shit, women are hard work.

Do you know how bad I want you? I have half the nerve to stop the elevator and fuck you three ways to Sunday right here.

I enjoyed my appetizer.” Can she get any better?

Maybe great sex will have me forgetting about bad things. There’s only one way to find out.

Let me watch as I make love to you for the first time.

Come with me. Let’s come together the first time we make love.

Even with all the risk, he’s a part of me now and I know there’s no looking back. I couldn’t stop it even if I wanted to. And that right there just might be the start of my demise.

My soul feels like it just cracked open and sprung a new life of its own. I slowly shake my head because I can’t believe how many years I’ve let her run to another guy for fear I would lose my best friend.

He’s going to lose it because you’re going to look smoking hot. Two can play this game, sweetheart. And quite frankly, women are better at it.

It’s careless of me, but I can’t seem to slow down with her. My heart races when I’m with her. I hope hers does too.

Because you promised to fuck me against that wall and I don’t like when people go back on their word.

That’s it, beauty. You’re a fucking queen.

If I let you fall through my grasp because of something Aiden said, I’m sorry. What kind of man does that make me? “You deserve a partner who will stand up to him and fight for you. Hopefully, I’ll get there soon because I can’t see life without you.

Dori’s worth dealing with Aiden’s wrath.

I’m not losing a billion dollars because Dori decided to get into bed with him.

The universe is not on my side when it comes to her. Maybe it’s for the best.

I wish I didn’t love her because this would be a lot easier if I didn’t.

She stole a piece of me and I’m wondering if she’ll give it back or keep it safe.

Here’s to falling for you even more than I already was. You’ve got a hold of something inside of me. I can’t wait until the next time I can kiss you.

You’re not spinning out of control and freaking out? His dick must have some personality-changing abilities.

He claimed you? Holy shit on a stick. How do you get this and I get ‘Do you want to do it?’ It’s unfair.

PS. I lied when I said I would only be thinking about the meeting today. I couldn’t get my mind off last night. You’ve wrecked me for life.

I’ll try, but you make it awfully hard. And if another man approaches you… I don’t know what I’ll do.

If I can’t have her, at least I’ll be taking a billion dollars from the guy who can.

It’s okay to love something even though it’s not here now.

Damn. You’re getting tighter.” He slows down and teases me. “Then fuck me harder and stretch me open. Show me how bad you want me.

She could break me in half. All she has to do is walk away, and that’s a terrifying thought.

She’s beautiful in anything she has on—or off, for that matter.

Someone should tie me up and throw me in a cage so I can never get out.

I used to think there was a never for us. But now I know there’s never been a never with you. It’s always been you. I want to be with you. So, would you want to take a chance with me and see if we can figure this out together?

It’s a beautiful sunlit Monday in August, the kind of day that would make your heart sing, your spirit rise. It’s lunchtime, and I’m standing in an absent-minded fog by the German sausage stall in Borough Market, under London Bridge. I can hear the trains rumbling overhead, and it reminds me of that scene from The Godfather, the one where Michael Corleone is about to assassinate his father’s rival mafia boss. Trains always seem to rumble overhead in movies when something ominous is about to happen, and it’s kind of spooky, not to mention fitting, because things couldn’t get much more ominous for me, right now.

regression as dummy variables Explain the importance of the error term plot Identify assumptions of regression, and know how to test and correct assumption violations Multiple regression is one of the most widely used multivariate statistical techniques for analyzing three or more variables. This chapter uses multiple regression to examine such relationships, and thereby extends the discussion in Chapter 14. The popularity of multiple regression is due largely to the ease with which it takes control variables (or rival hypotheses) into account. In Chapter 10, we discussed briefly how contingency tables can be used for this purpose, but doing so is often a cumbersome and sometimes inconclusive effort. By contrast, multiple regression easily incorporates multiple independent variables. Another reason for its popularity is that it also takes into account nominal independent variables. However, multiple regression is no substitute for bivariate analysis. Indeed, managers or analysts with an interest in a specific bivariate relationship will conduct a bivariate analysis first, before examining whether the relationship is robust in the presence of numerous control variables. And before conducting bivariate analysis, analysts need to conduct univariate analysis to better understand their variables. Thus, multiple regression is usually one of the last steps of analysis. Indeed, multiple regression is often used to test the robustness of bivariate relationships when control variables are taken into account. The flexibility with which multiple regression takes control variables into account comes at a price, though. Regression, like the t-test, is based on numerous assumptions. Regression results cannot be assumed to be robust in the face of assumption violations. Testing of assumptions is always part of multiple regression analysis. Multiple regression is carried out in the following sequence: (1) model specification (that is, identification of dependent and independent variables), (2) testing of regression assumptions, (3) correction of assumption violations, if any, and (4) reporting of the results of the final regression model. This chapter examines these four steps and discusses essential concepts related to simple and multiple regression. Chapters 16 and 17 extend this discussion by examining the use of logistic regression and time series analysis. MODEL SPECIFICATION Multiple regression is an extension of simple regression, but an important difference exists between the two methods: multiple regression aims for full model specification. This means that analysts seek to account for all of the variables that affect the dependent variable; by contrast, simple regression examines the effect of only one independent variable. Philosophically, the phrase identifying the key difference—“all of the variables that affect the dependent variable”—is divided into two parts. The first part involves identifying the variables that are of most (theoretical and practical) relevance in explaining the dependent

The moderate person contains opposing capacities..... A moderate person can start out with these divisions and rival tendencies, but to live a coherent life, the moderate must find a series of balances and proportions. The moderate is forever seeking a series of temporary arrangements, embedded in the specific situation of the moment, that will help him or her balance the desire for security with the desire for risk, the call of liberty with the need for restraint. The moderate knows there is no ultimate resolution to these tensions. Great matters cannot be settled by taking into account just one principle or one viewpoint. Governing is more like sailing in a storm: shift your weight one way when the boat tilts to starboard, shift your weight the other way when it tilts to port— adjust and adjust and adjust to circumstances to keep the semblance and equanimity of an even keel. ...The moderate knows she cannot have it all. There are tensions between rival goods, and you just have to accept that you will never get to live a pure and perfect life, devoted to one truth or one value.

The brig Henrietta having made Sandy Hook a little before the dinner hour – and having passed the Narrows about three o’clock – and then crawling to and fro, in a series of tacks infinitesimal enough to rival the calculus, across the grey sheet of the harbour of New-York – until it seemed to Mr Smith, dancing from foot to foot upon deck, that the small mound of the city waiting there would hover ahead in the November gloom in perpetuity, never growing closer, to the smirk of Greek Zeno – and the day being advanced to dusk by the time Henrietta at last lay anchored off Tietjes Slip, with the veritable gables of the city’s veritable houses divided from him only by one hundred foot of water – and the dusk moreover being as cold and damp and dim as November can afford, as if all the world were a quarto of grey paper dampened by drizzle until in danger of crumbling imminently to pap: – all this being true, the master of the brig pressed upon him the virtue of sleeping this one further night aboard, and pursuing his shore business in the morning. (He meaning by the offer to signal his esteem, having found Mr Smith a pleasant companion during the slow weeks of the crossing.) But Smith would not have it. Smith,

I wanted to do this properly, but I look at you and I forget...

One more crack like that, Chatsfield, and you'll have to entertain yourself in your little hideaway.' Antonio took her hand again and found himself feeling serious as he said, 'Not a chance. You're not escaping now.

In Girl World someone always had to be planning something or spreading rumors about her rival. If she didn't like someone, why not just stay away from her?

There is this other thought that he has overcome the world by the gift of the Holy Spirit. That gift was practically the world’s conquest. Jesus has set up a rival kingdom now: a kingdom of love and righteousness; already the world feels its power by the Spirit. I do not believe that there is a dark place in the centre of Africa which is not to some extent improved by the influence of Christianity; even the wilderness rejoices and is glad for him. No barbarous power dares to do what it once did, or if it does there is such a clamour raised against its cruelty that very soon it has to say peccavi, [I have sinned] and confess its faults.

Over the course of seventy years, Isobel had learned how indiscriminately unkind Life could be. She also knew that cataloguing and reviewing examples of such cruelty was, in itself, a masochistic exercise. One that she'd habitually and rigorously trained herself to refrain from engaging in. Better to focus on those events that demonstrated the grace and beauty with which Life could perform, without rival, when bestowing on her captive audience a distinctively intermittent yet consistently welcomed generosity of spirit.

My concern at times is nothing more than establishing a series of practical considerations that will enable me to work. For years I said if I could only find a comfortable chair I would rival Mozart.

And nothing quite rivaled the welcoming smell of well-worn books.

Mohammed was a narcissist and egoist, determined that no one else should ever rival his glory and importance and so he deliberately set out to make it impossible for any Muslim to surpass him. It was very clever for Mohammed to call himself the seal of prophets and thus for the Koran to be the last word – cutting off any future changes, and making Mohammed’s elevated status as God’s messenger permanent. The Koran is asserted to be the verbatim word of God, the last word of God, the final revelation. One has to wonder why God had to make several attempts at his revelation in the first place, using several prophets. Why not just one prophet and one revelation, explaining everything forever? Why bother with a string of Jewish prophets, before inexplicable switching to an Arab prophet to be the most important prophet of all? Muslims believe that not Mohammed but Allah was the founder of Islam. Why did Allah not simply appear to the world and declare his message? Why use these bizarre intermediaries – these strange prophets? It makes no sense at all.

My attraction to him is wickedly savage. I have so many naughty things I want to do with him.

I love it when ‘I don’t give a fuck about anything’ Dori comes out to play.

Just look at him. That’s nothing but a billion-dollar, hot as molten lava god.

Oh, a woman who’s brave enough to go toe to toe with me. Even more beautiful.

Nothing like baptism by fire, but shit’s about to hit the fan.

I’m glad you didn’t get the memo. This dress is something else. I’m glad I didn’t miss seeing you in this.

Jesus, Dori. Those emerald eyes get me every time.

Bringing up my sexual interests is a dick comment, considering he’s the one who introduced me to the particular kink I like. Whatever. That’s irrelevant right now.

You kiss better than I imagined you would.

I’m done with all the clothes between us. If she’ll let me, I’m ready to tear them off.

I want her more than I’ve wanted anything in my life.

There’s not one inch of her body that I don’t want to taste, but first her dress has to go.

I just got wrapped up in your eyes. You’re an exotic beauty and I can’t believe you’re standing before me.

My gaze drags the length of her body as the black barrier disappears. She’s wearing red lace lingerie. And red is now my favorite color. Her hair, her lingerie, her taste, her smell… It’s all red.

Jamison Stone may think he’s done his homework, but he doesn’t know all the tricks I have up my sleeve. One way or another, I will find out what he’s hiding. He can count on it.

Don’t act like I don’t know who you are. Your mission in life is to make every woman you meet want you.

And believe me, I have no intention of Dorothy Fisher becoming a hobby.” No. If anything, I want to dive in full time with Ms. Fisher.

This should probably be a one-time-only thing.” “Not a chance in hell, beauty. This is just the beginning. It’s a good thing you got a nap today because I plan on keeping you up into all hours of the night.

This woman confuses the fuck out of me.

Goddamn. She’s a fucking dream.

This woman’s found a way into my heart and I’m shocked at what little time it took.

You’re just as stunning, it’s unfair how men just look fantastic while women have to work at it.” “You always embody beauty.

And I can’t forget how much he turns me on. His eyes alone have me spellbound.

You said there was only one reason to date her. What’s that?” My body stiffens. “I love her. I always have.

Every part of you is perfect. This lingerie set… Fuck.

I think you’re going to kill me right now.

I don’t know what’s worse. Him checking out every woman that enters the restaurant or a conversation that bores me to tears.

Don’t worry, beauty. You have all night to touch me. Right now, I want to taste you.