When your family is twice as weird as normal, you have to be twice as polite to authority, because authority hates weird.

Focus, Amy. Just because he looked great in the saddle did not mean he wasn't an axe murderer.

Emery cut in impatiantly, "For crying out loud. Who do you think you are, Nancy Drew?" Hey," I snapped, because no one sniped at my sister but me, and Mark echoed with a stern "Chill, dude." Phin was unperturbed. "Those books were highly unrealistic. Do you have any idea how much brain damage a person would have if she were hit on the head and drugged with chloroform that often?

Faith isn't absence of doubt. It's belief without proof, not without question.

"Oh My God," I blurted, grabbing onto Phin as we faced the open bedroom door. "It's the axe murderer." "I doubt he would knock," she said, but she was whispering, too, and didn't move away from me.

Screw you, John." "Sorry, Sylvie. Can't—they frown on that kind of thing between step-siblings.

He rose to his feet in one fluid move, the better to look down at me. “You don’t know me, princess. Some people have reasons for doing things, and don’t just go wherever they’re told or drift whichever way they’re pushed.