“Beautiful building, Phoebe said. Sam nodded. Classical Revival, he said. It was yet another display of his seemingly unending knowledge that both made her proud and made her feel very small. Maybe ...”

“What if things happened to youspecial, magic thingsbecause youd been preparing for them?”

“Phoebe realized how very wrong shed been about this house, this family. It was far darker, more dangerous than the places shed grown up in. In the dingy little apartments her mother rented, everyth...”

“Storytelling wasn't about making things up. It was more like inviting the stories to come through her, let themselves be told.”

“She closed her eyes. Said the four most comforting words she knew: "Once upon a time." An incantation.”

“The world was full of dangers now that she was pregnant: mercury in tuna, hot tubs, beer, secondhand smoke, over-the-counter medicine. Not to mention crazy baby-abducting fairy kings.”

“One time, when I was little more than a baby, I was taken to visit my grandmother, who was living in a cottage on a nearly uninhabited stretch of beach in northern Florida. All I remember of this v...”

“A baby is a beautiful, blooming, flower that can smile, sing, and dance.”

“A baby is a symbol of peace, a plot of dreams, a light of hope, and a bundle of joy.”

“Endless moons, an opaque universe, thunder, tornadoes, the quaking earth. Rare moments of peace; forehead up against my knees, arms around my head, I though, I listened, I longed not to exist. but ...”

“Many of our problems in US maternity care stem from the fact that we leave no room for recognizing when nature is smarter than we are.”

“A child is reliving millions of years of Evolution from a single cell to a XXI Century Human. This is the most amazing miracle I've ever encountered, and I am truly grateful to the Nature for letti...”

“The women looked from one to the other, knowing what the men didnt know. We knew the heartbeat and interior graces, compensation for our own clumsiness; the beatitude as we renounced our bodies, ou...”

“The condom broke. I know how stupid that sounds. It's the reproductive version of the dog ate my homework.”

“After a good roll in the hay, when hes all peaceful and serene and he hasnt a worry or a care in the world, and the euphoric calm of release is drifting through his cerebrum, thats when you broadsi...”