“Her kung fu is that powerful.”

“Fear can’t hurt you,” she said. “When it washes over you, give it no power. It’s a snake with no venom. Remember that. That knowledge can save you.”

“Something about her suggested that her leisure activities included wrestling large woodland animals and banging bricks together.”

“Once again, her parents' problems had run through her life like a piece of heavy equipment, smashing everything in their way.”

“I could envision it all to clearly: Stuart or Debbie finding the dented door off its hinges, lying in the snow. "She came in, ravaged the boy, stole plastic bags, and ripped off the door in her escape," the police would say in the APB. "Probably making her way to bust her parents out of jail.”

“It was probably a good idea to have you possible future stepmother think you were a little nuts. It would keep her on her toes and dissuade her from trying to sit down and have touchy-feely talks. Not that she expected that from Julia. Julia looked like she might head-butt people in meetings.”

“Every time you try to flirt with her, a puppy dies.”