The happiest she'd ever been was with him, and the saddest. Was that the true test of love?

To be lost and forgotten-to be abandoned-is a shared and terrible fear, just as our fondest hope, as we grow older, is that we might leave some parts of us behind in the hearts of those we love and in that way live on.

The sins of the Midwest: flatness, emptiness, a necessary acceptance of the familiar. Where is the romance in being buried alive? In growing old?

The happiest she'd ever been was with him, and the saddest. Was that the true test of love?

All stories teach us something, and promise us something, whether they're true or invented, legend or fact.

Saul Bellow once said, 'A writer is a reader who has moved to emulation' — which I think is true. I just started writing and made that jump from reader to writer and learned how hard it was, but also how much fun it was — losing myself in these imaginary worlds.

The spirit of Jane Eyre looms over Once Upon a Day. Lisa Tucker keeps the plot of this gothic novel bubbling with tons of juicy family secrets.