“And, as Rhonda told the story, she thought: this is how the past gets passed down. This is how memories are made. Half-invented, embellished, given a touch of whimsy.”

“Storytelling wasn't about making things up. It was more like inviting the stories to come through her, let themselves be told.”

“Oh my God!” Sam said again, his voice shaking. I’ve given birth to something inhuman, Phoebe thought. A lamprey with row after row of teeth.”

“And deep down, she felt like maybe she didn't deserve it-that she belonged with the petty thieves and guys who drank Pabst Blue Ribbon for breakfast”

“Lisa smiled. 'You know how sometimes, you catch the faintest hint of movement in the corner of your eye, then you blink and it's gone? That's them.”

“Phoebe realized how very wrong she’d been about this house, this family. It was far darker, more dangerous than the places she’d grown up in. In the dingy little apartments her mother rented, everything was out in the open. Their lives were dirty and squalid, but they didn’t pretend to be anything else. Here, things seemed so normal, so perfect, but it was all a deception.”

“...they were exactly what the other needed; the missing piece that made everything else magically click into place.”