The job of every generation is to discover the flaws of the one that came before it. That's part of growing up, figuring out all the ways your parents and their friends are broken.

Killing things shouldn't make you happy, Rosa. That's why they're worried.

When you're a boy your life can be measured out as a series of uncomfortable conversations reluctantly initiated by adults in an effort to tell you things that you either already know or really don't want to know.

When I was little, I made up my own fairy tales, and the ghostly echo of 'Once upon a time' shapes all the fiction I've ever written.

She promised to be good. She wasn't.

Rosa!" Sally says. "The police are here to help you, not to hear a lecture on comparative murder rates.