Once upon a time, this moment - this last light of the evening the day before the race - was the best moment of the year for me. The anticipation of the game to come. But that was when all I had to lose was my life.

Cole made a hissing sound. "Are you inside yet? God bless America and all her sons. What is taking you so long?" The front door was locked. "Here, talk to Grace" "Mommy isn't going to give a different answer than Daddy," Cole said, but I handed her the phone anyway.

I wasn't sure if I admired him for feeling everything so hard and fiercely, or if I was contemptuous of him for having so much emotion that he had to spill it out every window of the house.

His face was just strange enough that she wanted to keep looking at it.

I don't think I could ever give up music. It's what makes me tick. If there was no music, there would be no writing.

You are being self-pitying." "I'm nearly done. You don't have much more of this to bear." "I like you better this way." "Crushed and broken," Gansey said. "Just the way women like 'em.

And there is the girl. When I first see her and her dun mare from my vantage point on the cliff road, I am struck first not by the fact that she is a girl, but by the fact that she's in the ocean. it's the dreaded second day, the day people start to die, and no one will get close to the surf. But there she is, trotting up to the knee in the water. Fearless.