"People were like Russian nesting dolls - versions stacked inside the latest edition. But they all still lived inside, unchanged, just out of sight."
~ Megan Miranda
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Megan Miranda stands as a luminary in the realm of contemporary fiction, her pen wielding tales that entwine mystery, suspense, and an intricate tapestry of human emotions. With each stroke of her narrative brush, she crafts worlds that captivate readers, leaving them spellbound with every turn of the page. Let us delve into the life, works, and distinct literary flair of this esteemed author.
Born and raised in New Jersey, Megan Miranda’s literary odyssey began as a voracious reader with an insatiable appetite for storytelling. Her academic pursuits led her to study biology and anthropology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an academic foundation that enriches her narrative with depth and authenticity.
After earning her degree, Miranda ventured into the corporate world, working in biotechnology before transitioning to full-time writing. Her early experiences in science and academia seep into her narratives, infusing them with an analytical precision and a keen eye for detail.
Miranda’s bibliography boasts a constellation of acclaimed works, each a testament to her narrative prowess. Among her most renowned novels are "All the Missing Girls," a New York Times bestseller hailed for its innovative reverse chronological storytelling, and "The Girl from Widow Hills," a gripping tale of identity, trauma, and the unreliability of memory.
"Daughter of Mine" stands as another jewel in Miranda’s literary crown, weaving a complex web of family secrets, buried truths, and the enduring bonds between mothers and daughters. With its masterful blend of suspense and emotional depth, the novel has garnered widespread acclaim, captivating readers and critics alike.
Miranda’s writing is characterized by its lyrical prose, meticulous plotting, and unflinching exploration of human psyche. She possesses a rare gift for building tension, drawing readers into her narratives with each carefully crafted sentence. Her stories unfold like intricately constructed puzzles, inviting readers to piece together clues and unravel mysteries alongside her characters.
What endears readers to Megan Miranda’s work is her ability to blend gripping suspense with profound insights into the human condition. Her characters are vividly drawn, their struggles and triumphs resonating long after the final page is turned. Miranda delves into themes of identity, memory, and the complexities of interpersonal relationships with nuance and empathy, striking a chord with readers of all ages.
While each of Megan Miranda’s novels stands as a literary gem in its own right, she is perhaps best known for "All the Missing Girls" and "The Girl from Widow Hills." These novels have earned her widespread acclaim and a dedicated fan base, cementing her status as a master of the psychological thriller genre.
Miranda’s literary contributions have not gone unnoticed, garnering her critical acclaim and prestigious accolades. She has been celebrated by peers and readers alike for her exceptional storytelling prowess, earning accolades such as the Edgar Award nomination for Best Paperback Original for "All the Missing Girls."
To delve into the pages of a Megan Miranda novel is to embark on a journey of suspense, intrigue, and emotional depth. Her stories linger in the mind long after the final chapter, leaving readers spellbound with their intricately woven narratives and hauntingly relatable characters. Whether you seek a pulse-pounding thriller or a thought-provoking exploration of the human condition, Miranda’s work offers a literary feast for the senses.
As anticipation mounts for her next literary offering, Megan Miranda continues to captivate audiences with teasers of her forthcoming novel. While details remain shrouded in secrecy, one thing is certain: readers can expect another enthralling tale that showcases Miranda’s unparalleled storytelling prowess.
Megan Miranda stands as a luminary in the realm of contemporary fiction, her tales weaving a spellbinding tapestry of mystery, suspense, and human emotion. With each new novel, she invites readers to embark on a journey of discovery, offering a glimpse into the complexities of the human experience. As her literary legacy continues to unfold, one thing remains certain: Megan Miranda’s storytelling prowess knows no bounds.
Megan Miranda Best Quotes
“I hadn't known that a light could be a feeling and a sound could be a color and a kiss could be both a question and an answer. And that heaven could be the ocean or a person or this moment or something else entirely.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“If you had one day left to live, what would you do?”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“People were like Russian nesting dolls - versions stacked inside the latest edition. But they all still lived inside, unchanged, just out of sight.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“A cut. That's what I felt. Words can cut, slice, like a razor.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“Alot can happen in eleven minutes. Decker can run two miles in eleven minutes. I once wrote an English essay in ten. And God knows Carson Levine can talk a girl out of her clothes in less then half that time.
Eleven minutes might as well be eternity underwater. It only takes three minutes without air for loss consciousness. Permanent brain damange begins at four minutes. And then, when the oxygen runs out, full cardiac arrest occurs. Death is possible at five minutes. Probable at seven. Definite at ten.
Decker pulled me out at eleven.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“My mother always wanted to live near the water," she said. "She said it's the one thing that brings us all together. That I can have my toe in the ocean off the coast of Maine, and a girl my age can have her toe in the ocean off the coast of Africa, and we would be touching. On opposite sides of the world.”
― Megan Miranda, Vengeance“I wasn't athletic and had no desire to work out, so I watched what I ate. Correction: I ate what I wanted and felt guilty about it later.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“There is nothing more dangerous, nothing more powerful, nothing more necessary and essential for survival than the lies we tell ourselves. I”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“I leaned against my door, struggling to catch my breath, and thought that maybe hell wasn't a place at all, but a thing. A contagious thing. A thing that could creep up the steps, seep through the crack under my door, grow horns and sprout fire - smelling faintly like sulfur. A thing that could sink its tendrils inside and take root, coloring everything gray and distorting a smile into a sneer. And while i got dressed for the play, swatted at my back and kept running my hands over my stomach because I could feel it, I swear, I could feel it reaching for me, trying to grab hold.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“The first time I died, I didn't see God. No light at the end of the tunnel. No haloed angels. No dead grandparents. To be fair, I probably wasn't a solid shoo-in for Heaven. But, honestly, I kind of assumed I'd make the cut.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“Truth is, I don't know. I don't know... what I'm doing. Or why I'm doing it," he said. Which was the worst excuse in the history of excuses. "I don't know what's up or down anymore. I feel like I'm..." He stopped speaking and winced.
Drowning, I said. "You were going to say you feel like you're drowning."
He nodded. I wonder how many people I took with me when I feel into the lake. How many sunk with me. I thought I had been alone under the water, but maybe I wasn't.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“If there's a feeling to home, it's this. A place where there are no secrets, where nothing stays buried; not the past and not yourself. Where you can be all the versions of you, see it all reflected back at you as you walk the same stairs, the same halls, the same rooms. Feel the ghost of your mother as you sit at the kitchen table, hear the words of your father circling round and round after dinner, and your brother stopping by, wishing you'd be a little better, a little stronger.... It's four walls echoing back everything you've ever been and everything you've ever done, and it's the people who stay despite it all. Through it all. For it all.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“I hoped he'd take his dog and drive down to the ocean. I hoped there was still time. I pictured him sitting on the gray rocks with the waves crashing and spraying white foam. Maybe he'd hear something in the roar of the ocean, feel some limitless power, believe that there's something greater. Something more. Maybe his heaven was at the coast, with a dog's head in his lap, with nothing but water and depth from there to the horizon." -Delaney”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“I think...I think its always been you who was dying,"- Delaney”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“If I were a monster, I'd pretend to be human.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“We were in a pit. Fitting. This was, after all, my hell. This pit around the lake. The lake that had taken so much. My friendship with Decker. My humanity. Quite nearly my life. And I was so angry with it. I wasn't scared anymore. I was furious.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“Funny hoe everything can change in an instant. From death to life. From empty to full. From darkness to light.
Or maybe I just wasn't looking. I hadn't known that light could be a feeling and sound could be a color and a kiss could be both a question and an answer. And that heaven could be the ocean or a person or this moment or something else entirely.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“The past, boxed up and stacked out of sight. But never too far away”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“The darkness lives in everyone. She knew this better than anyone. Everyone had two faces, and she looked deep into us until she found it.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“There was a small part of me that was still childish, stubborn in her hope, thinking I could somehow have everything.
...That I could be all the versions of me, stacked inside one another, and find someone who would want them all. But that's childhood. Before you realize that every step is a choice. That something must be given up for something to be gained. Everything on a scale, a weighing of desires, an ordering of which you want more--and what you'd be willing to give for it.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“Here’s the thing I’ve learned about leaving—you can’t really go back”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“To what do I owe the pleasure of your company?" he said.
I placed my hands flat on the table and leaned across it. "Stay the hell away from him."
Who? Oh, you mean the guy who's gonna bite it soon?
He's not. He's going to be fine.
He reached a hand out and placed it over my own. I snatched my hand back. He shook his head at me and whispered, "You can't stop it."
"Watch me.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture
tags: death, delaney, troy
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“Decker went to Greece a few summers ago and showed me pictures from his trip.Aren't these awesome?"" he had said, pointing out photographs of the ancient ruins."
Awesome I agreed, but I felt dizzy. The ruins were just a reminder that what had been was no longer. That everything we are will be gone someday. That I will be forgotten.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“When I went from feeling nothing to everything and couldn't stop screaming because it turned out the everything was blinding pain.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“I feel like the whole world is off balance. Like I'm losing my shit. Like there's this cliff and I don't even realize I'm on the edge.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“That hell can be temporary. That there's a way out.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“Funny how everything can change in an instant. From death to life. From empty to full. From darkness to light.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“Intention is nice, but it's a thing sometimes based more on hope than on reality.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“I wasn't sure who I was most scared of at the moment. The stranger I was learning about too quickly, or the woman I'd known my entire life that was quickly becoming a stranger.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“Promises made without clarity of thought still counted. A careless yes and you were bound.”
― Megan Miranda, The Last House Guest“Missing girls had a way of working their way into someone's head. You couldn't help but see them in everyone - how temporary and fragile we might be. One moment here, and the next, nothing more than a photo staring from a storefront window.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“We were a town full of fear, searching for answers. But we were also a town full of liars.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“If you pretend something hard enough, could it become real?”
― Megan Miranda, Hysteria“Time isn’t running out. It’s not even real,” he said, and I knew I had lost him—he was lost, circling in his own mind. “It’s just a measure of distance we made up to understand things. Like an inch. Or a mile.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“It wasn’t in church but in moments like this when I maybe believed in God or something like that. Some order to the chaos, some meaning. That we collide with the people we need, that we meet the ones who will love us, that there’s some underlying reason to everything.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“I thought that this must be what purgatory was like. Can't go forward. Can't go back. Awaiting some official judgment.”
― Megan Miranda, Hysteria“I weigh my words before I say them. They're one thing I do have control over. And so I am purposeful with them. Deliberate. I decide what to give and what to hide. I watch for reactions. I study their impact.”
― Megan Miranda, Soulprint“Amazing how something that happened so long ago can feel so fresh. How it could come back to haunt you from nowhere- the innocuous ring of a telephone, the past come to call from the other end.”
― Megan Miranda, The Perfect Stranger“But that was the thing about loving someone—it only counted when you knew their flaws and did it anyway.”
― Megan Miranda, The Last House Guest“People were like Russian nesting dolls—versions stacked inside the latest edition. But they all still lived inside, unchanged, just out of sight.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“And time standing perfectly, painfully still. It's just a thing we created. A measure of distance. A way to understand. A way to explain things. It can weave around and show you things if you let it.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“You change. But the past, it’s still there. The only thing moving is you.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“There is nothing more dangerous, nothing more powerful, nothing more necessary and essential for survival than the lies we tell ourselves.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“It is quite true what philosophy says; that life must be understood backwards. —SØREN KIERKEGAARD”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“But friends to call for the deep things, the things that live in the dark spaces of our hearts? Those people didn’t exist for me any longer.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“It was so easy to pretend that everything was normal. We’ve always been great pretenders here.”
― Megan Miranda, Such a Quiet Place“The truest type of story is the kind you tell all alone, to yourself”
― Megan Miranda, The Girl from Widow Hills“All of you, you miss too much, looking down instead of out. A screen is no match for reality.”
― Megan Miranda, The Last to Vanish“There were tiny moments, like this, when the grief came on strong out of nowhere. It was sneaky, and tricky, and you couldn’t see it coming until it was already there. It came with the mundane, simple tasks: My mother would never be hanging pink streamers at my shower. I would never lean over to someone and conspiratorially whisper, My mother is crazy. She would never become a grandmother.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“But here’s the thing I’ve learned about leaving—you can’t really go back.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“My brain scrambled to make room for the existene of these people. Grandparents I'd never known. They went from hypothetical, empty memories to blurry, unformed shapes in my head. Dead one second, alive the next.
Kind of like me.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“I believed fate was an accumulation of decisions, not all of them yours.”
― Megan miranda, The Only Survivors“And then I started laughing. Horrible, really. But I was laughing. Because of all the things they could say about me, equal parts horrible and true, this was so far from the mark it was funny.”
― Megan Miranda, Hysteria“The past always had a thousand ways in.”
― Megan Miranda, The Last to Vanish“I’ve known enough of loss to accept that grief may lose its sharpness with time, but memory only tightens. Moments replay.”
― Megan Miranda, The Last House Guest“Who would win in a fight? The past or the future? The past. Every time. It was relentless.”
― Megan Miranda, Vengeance“Maybe hell was just an absence of something. A void waiting to be filled.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“Stop talking now. Dom told us how you work. You take information, and then you use it."
It's such an absurd statement, I have no idea how on earth to respond. Isn't that exactly what you're supposed to do with information? Do people just collect it and store it, spouting out facts when prompted like a computer?”
― Megan Miranda, Soulprint“The danger is everywhere. It’s everyone. It’s the parts we keep hidden, and the darkness inside, fighting to get out. The only thing I did was take people down with me. They tied themselves to my anchor, and we fell.”
― Megan Miranda, The Safest Lies“All things happen in an instant. Everything could change in a moment”
― Megan Miranda, The Perfect Stranger“Everything, she realized in that stark moment of clarity, had always been out of her control.”
― Megan Miranda, The Only Survivors“It is quite true what philosophy says; that life must be understood backwards. But then one forgets the other principle: that it must be lived forwards. —SØREN KIERKEGAARD”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“But the simple truth was that when a girl like Corinne loves you, you don’t ask why. You just hope it doesn’t change. Tyler”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“I knew how I was supposed to feel when I was with him. Well, I knew what I was not supposed to feel. I wasn't supposed to feel anxious. Not tense, either. Or maybe I was. Maybe this was normal. I didn't know. So I let him whisper in my ear and put his hands on my hips. And I listened to him list the ways in which I was slowly killing him.
None of which turned out to be the actual way that I killed him.”
― Megan Miranda, Hysteria“My mother hid the knife block.”
― Megan Miranda, Hysteria“Funny how everything can change in an instant.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“But the truth is that the only reason I could understand what I was feeling in that moment was because I had spent years loving her.”
― Megan Miranda, Vengeance“There's no pattern to falling in love. At least, nothing I can understand. Not something I could see beforehand. Not something I can decipher after, either. Trust can be earned, piece by piece, like links of a chain. But love is more like faith, or belief: it's a leap. It's hurtling over the edge of the cliff and trusting you will not drown.”
― Megan Miranda, Soulprint“The house felt different. Unsafe, unknown, too many possibilities existing all at once. Too many voices whispered back at me from the walls.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“Because the thing about standing here in the middle of the mountains with the rain coming down, in a house your grandfather built, is that it's too easy to notice how insignificant you are. How quickly you might go from something to nothing.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“But people must’ve realized what I too soon understood: that grief did not create anything that had not existed before. It only heightened what was already there. Removing the binds that once shielded me.”
― Megan Miranda, The Last House Guest“This was what people wanted: They wanted it all. They wanted to fit you in a box. Hold you in the palm of one hand. Sum you up in one sentence. The shorter, the better. So they could understand who you were and the role you were intended to play for their benefit.”
― Megan Miranda, The Girl from Widow Hills“I thought about that now--about how much of ourselves we leave behind in every interaction. How every place we've been, everything we say, can be used to craft a story.
[Harper Nash]”
― Megan Miranda, Such a Quiet Place“Time isn't running out. It's not even real," he said, and I knew I had lost him--he was lost, circling in his own mind. "It's just a measure of distance we made up to understand things. Like an inch. Or a mile." He moved his hands as he spoke, to accentuate the point. "That clock," he said, pointing behind him. "It's not measuring time. It's creating it. You see the difference?”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“People could get used to any change. All we needed was time.”
― Megan Miranda, Such a Quiet Place“Who do you save in the moment, when you have the chance? The answer was simple, and obvious, and always, always the same: whoever you can.”
― Megan Miranda, The Only Survivors“Or maybe I just wasn't looking. I hadn't known that a light could be a feeling and a sound could be a color and a kiss could be both a question and an answer. And that heaven could be the ocean or a person or this moment or something else entirely. But today, heaven was a wood-floored room with blue walls and a messy desk and Decker not letting go. He was still holding onto me.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“The truest type of story is the kind you tell all alone, to yourself.”
― Megan Miranda, The Girl from Widow Hills“I hated that I felt jealous. Hated it. It's not like I'd been on my own waiting for him, just like he hadn't been waiting alone for me. We had lived, for two years. Made choices and mistakes, had good days and bad days.”
― Megan Miranda, Hysteria“Time isn’t running out. It’s not even real, It’s just a measure of distance we made up to understand things. Like an inch. Or a mile. Clocks do not measuring time. They creat it!”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“But here's the thing I've learned about leaving- you can't really go back. I don't know what to do with Cooley Ridge anymore, and Cooley Ridge doesn't know what to do with me, either. The distance only increases with the years. Most times, if I tried to shift it back into focus...all I'd see was a caricature of it in my mind: a miniature town set up on entryway tables around the holidays, everything frozen in time.”
― Megan Miranda, All the Missing Girls“We sit in a room together and are told to trust each other. We are taught that good is the default and evil is rare. And then we learn that good was the mask. That we trusted too easily. Now people keep telling us to think for ourselves, look out for ourselves, keep an eye out for one another, and report what we see. But who should we report to? If we’re not sure who to trust? How do we know who wears the mask?”
― Megan Miranda, The Perfect Stranger“Do they not realize they have made me in her likeness? I think of what June is trying to lead me toward. What do they think I will do with it when I have no other options?”
― Megan Miranda, Soulprint“...We're more than just the history of our soul. More than our DNA. More than our past lives. We're the choices we've made in this life. Every one of them, giving us purpose.”
― Megan Miranda, Soulprint“Sometimes I didn't understand how someone who seemed so bold in personality could be so passive in action.”
― Megan Miranda, Such a Quiet Place“You become the stories you tell—I’d learned that much from my mother. The truest type of story is the kind you tell all alone, to yourself.”
― Megan Miranda, The Girl from Widow Hills“You couldn't keep your secrets if you wanted someone else's. You had to trade them all. It was only fair.”
― Megan Miranda, The Last to Vanish“I'm okay," I said again, because if I said it enough, maybe it'd be true.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“I breathed in deeply, feeling immediately at ease. I loved the smell of books. I kept breathing in until I felt too light, like I was inhaling all the knowledge from the books and there was no place for the information to go.”
― Megan Miranda, Fracture“the type of person who got kicked down and didn’t stay there.”
― Megan Miranda, The Perfect Stranger