“Andromeda.” Allister moved closer. “An autumn constellation, forty-four light-years away.” His steps were smooth and indifferent, but his voice was dry, as though he found my panic attack positively boring. His attitude brought a small rush of annoyance in, but it was suddenly swayed as my lungs contracted and wouldn’t release. I couldn’t keep a strangled gasp from escaping. “Look up.” It was an order, carrying a harsh edge. With no fight in me, I complied and tilted my head. Tears blurred my vision. Stars swam together and sparkled like diamonds. I was glad they weren’t. Humans would find a way to pluck them from the sky. “Andromeda is the dim, fuzzy star to the right. Find it.” My eyes searched it out. The stars weren’t often easy to see, hidden behind smog and the glow of city lights, but sometimes, on a lucky night like tonight, pollution cleared and they became visible. I found the star and focused on it. “Do you know her story?” he asked, his voice close behind me. A cold wind touched my cheeks, and I inhaled slowly. “Answer me.” “No,” I gritted. “Andromeda was boasted to be one of the most beautiful goddesses.” He moved closer, so close his jacket brushed my bare arm. His hands were in his pockets and his gaze was on the sky. “She was sacrificed for her beauty, tied to a rock by the sea.” I imagined her, a red-haired goddess with a heart of steel chained to a rock. The question bubbled up from the depths of me. “Did she survive?” His gaze fell to me. Down the tear tracks to the blood on my bottom lip. His eyes darkened, his jaw tightened, and he looked away. “She did.”
― The Maddest Obsession
― The Maddest Obsession
“no matter what difficulties people face, they will always have the strength to overcome them. It just takes heart.”
― Before the Coffee Gets Cold
― Before the Coffee Gets Cold
“But I wasn’t crying because I was sad. I guess I was crying because we had nowhere else to go, no choice but to go on living in this world. Crying because we had no other world to choose, and crying at everything before us, everything around us.”
― Heaven
― Heaven
“She said that was the only way for us to live, to be like the poets.”
― Sweet Bean Paste
― Sweet Bean Paste
“At the end of the day, whether one returns to the past or travels to the future, the present does not change. So it raises the question: just what is the point of that chair?”
― Before the Coffee Gets Cold
― Before the Coffee Gets Cold
Midnight’s 2023 Year in Books
Take a look at Midnight’s Year in Books. The good, the bad, the long, the short—it’s all here.
Midnight hasn't connected with her friends on Goodreads, yet.
Favorite Genres
Cookbooks, Fantasy, Fiction, Graphic novels, Historical fiction, History, Horror, Humor and Comedy, Literary Fiction, Mystery, Non-fiction, Poetry, Romance, Thriller, japanese-literature, new-adult, contemporary-romance, womens-fiction, dark, magical-realism, womens-studies, iran, cultural, indian-literature, retellings, india, asian-literature, literature, japan, and asia
Polls voted on by Midnight
Lists liked by Midnight