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The adult men in my community noticed my body was changing before I did, and they did not hesitate to keep me updated.

— Somebody's Daughter by Ashley C. Ford

One time a boy told me my mother was ugly, and I fought him so hard I ended up with a reputation. Ashley Ford will fight boys. I liked that.

— Somebody's Daughter by Ashley C. Ford

As I attempted to drive this boy into the sandpit beneath his writhing body, I remembered my grandmother telling me, “I never lost a fight in my life, because I never stopped fighting until I won.”

— Somebody's Daughter by Ashley C. Ford

I thought Princess Diana and Mary Magdalene would have looked similar. I thought the same about Billy Ray Cyrus and Jesus.

— Somebody's Daughter by Ashley C. Ford

Heidegger famously noted that the way we come to know a hammer is not by staring at it, but by grabbing hold of it and using it.

— Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew B. Crawford

Back in the 1950s, when the focal practice of baking was displaced by the advent of cake mix, Betty Crocker learned quickly that it was good business to make the mix not quite complete. The baker felt better about her cake if she was required to add an egg to the mix.

— Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew B. Crawford

And, with alarming suddenness, nothing happened.

— Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett

A 2023 paper in the Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis (there’s a journal for everything!) calculated an even higher return, finding that every dollar “invested in TB yields US $46 in benefits.”

— Everything Is Tuberculosis by John Green

People who are treated as less than fully human by the social order are more susceptible to tuberculosis. But it’s not because of their moral codes or choices or genetics; it’s because they are treated as less than fully human by the social order.

— Everything Is Tuberculosis by John Green

By the time of Eliza’s death, “consumptive chic,” as Carolyn Day termed it, had taken over European beauty standards. Women were discouraged from physical activity and too much time in the sun. “Languid and listless ladies sporting pale complexions were all the rage,” Day writes. The French novelist Henri Murger told of a young consumptive’s corpse that the glow of her face made it look like “she had died of beauty.”

— Everything Is Tuberculosis by John Green