"Darling Daddy,This is Rose.The shed needs new wires now it has blown up.Caddy is bringing home rock-bottom boyfriends to see if they will do for Mummy. Instead of you.Love, Rose."

"Since that time, I've had many similar moments, and I can never hear the words 'family' and 'home' without feeling that they sound strange, never simply hear them and let them go. When I stop to examine them, though, the words seem hollow, seem to rattle at my feet like empty cans."

"Actually, my mother and Alfie came for three weeks' Christmas vacation and stayed for 21 years. I guess my mother never went back because she was lonely."

"This was when it hit him! The thought of losing his entire family in one day suddenly made his heart ache in a way that he didn't think could be possible."

"On the line beside Describe your family, I wrote, 'Bad.'What is your favorite subject in school? 'None.'List three of your favorite activities. 'Soccer, ballet, and fighting.'Two of those favorite activities were lies but one of them was the truth.I am fond of fighting."

"I'm one of those people who had Christmas and my birthday always combined, and generally, my birthday was pretty much ignored. But my parents are always good about making some kind of special effort to make me feel like I also have a birthday that exists."

"He still had the power to stagger her at timessimply the fact that he was breathing that all his organs were in their proper places that blood flowed quietly and effectively through his small sturdy limbs. He was her flesh and blood her mother had told her in the hospital the day Akash was born."