“He peered into the night-dark windows of the afflicted girls, whispering names and stirring fits into their dreams until their own screams awakened them. The girls concocted fantastic stories of wi...”

“The world he thought he knew had become an odd thing, twisting time and purpose. But it had remained an unfair universe in the end.”

“Merry’s mind devolved into chaos. Ideas evaded her. Words chased one another into meaningless jumbles. Her breath came in shallow gasps as the ghastly image of William’s lifeless body twisting in t...”

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they ...”

“Does anything in nature despair except man? An animal with a foot caught in a trap does not seem to despair. It is too busy trying to survive. It is all closed in, to a kind of still, intense waiti...”

“It is a curious thing, but as one travels the world getting older and older, it appears that happiness is easier to get used to than despair. The second time you have a root beer float, for instanc...”

“The world he thought he knew had become an odd thing, twisting time and purpose. But it had remained an unfair universe in the end.”

“I am a child of the poisonous wind that copulated with the East River on an oil-slick, garbage infested midnight. I turn about on my own parentage. I inoculate against those very biles that brought...”

“How old are you?""Ah that is a good one. I do not know.""Before cars?""Before trains, before guns. Before people stole the curves from the high clouds and the angles from the flying flocks to build...”

“She killed her sons first. Hammering a long fence nail through each of their hearts. Then, taking an ax, she methodically beheaded each one of her brothers-in-law. Going out to the pens, she drove ...”