Violence up close has a smell. Like copper blood and charcoal burning.

Someone once told me that when you give birth to a daughter, you've just met the person whose hand you'll be holding the day you die.

and another claimed it was inherited through a parent who was a carrier of the defective gene. I had always assumed the latter was the case with Claire. After all, surely a child who grew out of grief would be born with a heavy heart.

What you didn't tell someone was just as debilitating as what you did.

I would have given anything to keep her little. They outgrow us so much faster than we outgrow them. Brian Fitzgerald, talking about his children.

I knew her well enough to understand that when Delia pushed you away, it was her way of making sure she didn't get shoved first.

Inside each of us is a monster; inside each of us is a saint. The real question is which one we nurture the most, which one will smite the other.