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Jodi Lynn Anderson

Jodi Lynn Anderson Biography

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“Tiger Lily made an attempt at a smile. After having felt the need to glower at other children for most of her life, smiles never came easily to her face. But this one was half all right. "I miss you already," he said. Tiger Lily wanted to say it back. But she held on to the words greedily, too caught in the habit of keeping herself a secret. And Peter-half sadly, half-expectantly-let her go.”

SecretSmilePeter PanTiger Lily
Book:Tiger Lily
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“Leeda looked straight out of Martha’s Vineyard---all perfect cheekbones and alabaster skin with a smattering of sun-induced freckles and clothes that were totally season-appropriate. Even loose and sloppy like she was today, she looked like the kind of loose and sloppy you saw in People magazine when they caught a celebrity all tired and mussed up at the airport. Birdie, on the other hand, was curved and rosy and Renoir soft. She looked like the milk-fed farm girl that she was. The two were second cousins but nothing alike. Leeda was straight up and down, and Birdie was as gentle and easy as the rain. Leeda had grown up wearing mostly white and exceeding everyone as the glossiest, the smilingest, and the most southern of the southern belles in Bridgewater. Birdie had grown up with dirt under her fingernails, homeschooled on the orchard, her feet planted in the earth. Before Judge Miller Abbott sentenced Murphy to time on the orchard picking peaches that summer, Murphy had pegged Leeda for uptight and Birdie for weak. But their time together---picking peaches, sweating in the dorms at night, cooling off in the lake---had been like living the fable of her life. The lesson being that when you think you know more than you do, you end up looking like an idiot.”

Best FriendsMore Than Meets The EyeSouthern Belles
Book:The Secrets of Peaches
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“The Undertaker frowned again. Her eyes flashed through scenes too quickly. for May to make out. "Your future profile is very confusing. I see great fear. You fear too many things. You even fear yourself. Why?" May stared blankly. "Oh yes. You don't believe in your heart. You doubt yourself. It's a great failing." The Undertaker gazed at her solemnly. " but there's also great courage.”

HeartFearCourage
Book:May Bird and the Ever After
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“They emerged into the sun again, covered in dust. Birdie took deep breaths, relieved to be back out in the open. She looked at Grey, unsure what she wanted to communicate but sure that it was huge and that she was powerless. But Grey seemed to recognize fear when he saw it. And he simply reached forward and pulled Birdie to him. She sank against his chest. It felt different than Enrico's body. Taller and firmer. It felt safe.”

UnderstandingAffectionNew Boy
Book:Love and Peaches
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“Look," Peter said. To the north was a series of vast grassy plains, and there, just looking like specks at first, was a herd of horses, a species that in Neverland had never been tamed. They were beautiful, flashes of brown and black and tan, their coats gleaming. There was no reason for them to be running that Tiger Lily could see. It was likely that they just loved to run. "That's what I want my life to be," Peter said, staring down at the horses. Tiger Lily sank against him and watched the herd, and thought that was what she wanted too.”

LoveLifeFreedomHorsesPeter PanTiger Lily
Book:Tiger Lily
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“You may think my jealousy would have been enormous during those days after Peter gave Tiger Lily the smallest kiss on the neck. And you would be right. But these moments were swallowed by a bigger emotion, my tenderness for Tiger Lily, which had grown to take up most of the space in my body, without me knowing it. I can't say I didn't dream that this was a passing moment of infatuation, and that eventually Peter would notice and pick me-as impossible as that might have seemed considering my size. But I felt protective of Tiger Lily. I felt that just by watching over her, I could somehow keep her safe. And I wanted to keep Peter safe too.”

JealousyProtectivePeter PanTinker BellTiger LilyTinkerbell
Book:Tiger Lily
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“Why do you keep loving me, Birdie?” Birdie looked at her like she was really thinking about it. “I love you because you’re Leeda. I just… I don't know, I guess it’s too late to not love you. So I just accept you.” Leeda tried to harness what she wanted to say. It was hard to put it into words. “I can’t even imagine what kind of person you see when you look at me. I mean, I can't think of who it is you think you’re accepting.” Birdie put her hand on Leeda’s and crushed her fingers in her brave Birdie way. “Just you, Leeda. I just love you whoever you are.”

Best Friends ForeverUnbreakable Love
Book:The Secrets of Peaches
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“It had been a couple of days since the girls had snuck out to the lake, and since then she’d been working harder. Not for Walter or for Darlington Orchard, but because of Birdie. She could see her through the trees, talking to a pair of workers by the house, looking unsure of herself as usual, her big eyes thoughtful. Murphy ruminated that she might be the first really nice person Murphy had ever met and actually liked. It was something about the way she was so sweet but so rugged when it came to the farm stuff---knowing all about the farm and the animals, like with the sleeping bird the other night. Yesterday she’d driven by in a rusted-out red tractor, spraying the trees. She was sweet. But she wasn’t soft. Murphy could respect that. And she had the uneasy feeling that she didn’t want to let her down.”

FriendshipAdmirable Qualities
Book:Peaches
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“Ooh, look." Birdie swerved out of line to a bushy plant full of purple flowers. She plucked a few delightedly. "Lilacs." She thrust them toward Leeda's face, and Leeda smiled, sniffing. Birdie could make something exciting out of anything on the orchard. She knew all the flowers, the species of birds, how much rainfall they could expect, where moss was likely to grow, which mushrooms were edible, and how long many of the trees had been in the ground. To walk across the property with Birdie was never just to walk through unnoticed space.”

IntrovertKnowledgeableEarthyCountry Girl
Book:Love and Peaches
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“She stopped in Eckerds to flirt with a guy she knew there and get some free Blow Pops. She leaned over the counter and pursed her lips and moved up and down on her toes while he dug out all the watermelons, her favorite. There was a scale with a mirror next to the pharmacy counter, and she stared at herself sideways. With her low-slung jeans and junk store green army coat, Murphy looked high-fidelity, full-color, and healthy. The counter boy’s voice pitched high when he asked her, nervous and awed, if she wanted anything else. Murphy smiled and stuck a Blow Pop in her mouth as she turned and sauntered out the door.”

TomboyWoman S Charm
Book:The Secrets of Peaches
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“She flipped through the notebook. In most places, Murphy’s large, crooked handwriting ate up the pages greedily, as if she couldn’t write large enough to get her point across. Occasionally Birdie’s more graceful handwriting appeared, adding asides or participating with Murphy in some kind of list she had thrown together, like favorite Leeda moments, or most unknown things about Leeda, or Leeda’s top five best articles of clothing. Mostly, though, it was all Murphy. Listing albums Leeda had to own before she died, like Janis Joplin’s Pearl. Copied scraps of her favorite poetry: about nature and despair and cities and even one or two about love that Murphy had annotated with words like Sickening, but she’s good and Horrible but worth reading. Dried leaves---pecan, magnolia, and, of course, the thin slivered shape of the peach leaf---taped in messy crisscrosses. A cider label Birdie had once kissed. A diagram of Leeda---outlined sloppily with colored-in blond hair, with words on the outside pointing to different parts of her: brainy pointing to her head, good posture pointing to her back, hot gams pointing to her legs, impenetrable (ha ha) pointing to her heart.”

RecommendationsPersonality TraitsPreferencesScrapbook
Book:The Secrets of Peaches
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