“Eventually your body will learn the alliances it has to make with itself,' Kenny had said - as if Cam was a factory full of strike-prone workers, or worse, a clutch of slaves forced into unwanted labor.”

“Sometimes we make our alliances not by the shape and color of our flesh but by the convictions of our heart.”

“The eternally sleeping princess, thinks Cam. But I shall free you from those poisoned brambles that surround your heart. And then you will have no choice but to love me.”

“There are worse things than being robbed..." I could smell the sick old-meat stench on his breath, like he really had eaten my grandmother. "...worse things than dyin' even. You be a good boy, Little Red, and maybe you'll get to live awhile. Maybe you'll get to die in your own natural time.”

“Which is worse, Risa often wondered, to have tens of thousands of babies that no one wanted or to silently make then go away before they were even born”

“Lord, if what I'm doing is wrong, then by all means strike me down. Otherwise set me free.”

“He only wishes there were something that would heal the scars in his mind, which he can still feel. He sees his mind now as an archipelago of islands that he labors to build bridges between - and while he's had great success engineering the most spectacular of bridges, he suspects there are some islands that he'll never reach.”