His eyes softened. "But it doesn't change what we are to each other. It's like there's always been a piece of my soul missing, and it's inside you, Clary. I know I told you once that whether God exists or not, we're on our own. But when I'm with you,...
Clary?" he thought. Her voice came through, tinged with alarm. "What is it? What's happened? Did my mom find out I'm gone?" "Not yet," he thought back. "Is Azazel the cat from the Smurfs?" There was a long pause. "That's Azrael, Simon. And no more us...
And spare me the jokes about scoring." "Dammit, woman, you read my mind," he said. "Is there no filthy wordplay you can't forsee?" "It's my special magical power. I can read your mind when you're thinking dirty thoughts." "So, ninety-five percent of ...
Simon rolled his eyes. "It's a good thing we know the person who's dating Magnus," he said. "Otherwise, I get the feeling we'd all just lie around all the time wondering what the hell to do next. Or try to raise the money to hire Magnus by selling le...
Excellent. I've been told I have a lovely, melodic reading voice." He flipped the book open to the front page, where the title was printed in ornate script. Across from it was a long dedication, the ink faded now and barely legible, though Clary coul...
Our story opens where countless stories have ended in the last twenty-seven years: with an idiot—in this case, Rebecca Atherton, head of the After the End Times Irwins, winner of the Golden Steve-o Award for valor in the face of the undead—decidi...
The fact is, I have been dead so long and it has been simply such a grim shoving of the hours behind me…since the hideous summer of ’78, when I went down to the deep sea, its dark waters closed over me and I knew neither hope nor peace.
But I don't think any parent can expect to escape this life without disappointing his child at some point. And the same could be said the other way around. We all of us fall short now and again, and disappoint someone dear to us, or ourselves. Thankf...
He did not want an affair with his boss. He did not even want a one-night stand. Because what always happened was that people found out, gossip at the water cooler, meaningful looks in the hallway. And sooner or later the spouses found out. It always...
He must love you very much,' Gavril said once I had my footing. I couldn't look at him. 'What makes you say that?' Gavril sighed. 'I've known Maxon since he was a child. He's never stood up to his father like that.
Our prayer is not simply, ‘Dear God, please send me a better job,’ but, ‘Dear God, enable me to see this situation differently, that this area of apparent lack might be healed inside my mind.
It had been an awful thing to lose Henry the first time, to matrimony, but to discover what a false front he was capable of was another kind of blow, and it had left her almost speechless. Then there was the fury with herself—for she had known what...
The average American child, by age eighteen, is estimated to have seen eighteen thousand murders and two hundred thousand acts of violence on television. The “death play” of popular video games is accelerating these numbers to ever-higher levels.
Moments before sleep are when she feels most alive, leaping across fragments of the day, bringing each moment into the bed with her like a child with schoolbooks and pencils. The day seems to have no order until these times, which are like a ledger f...
The universe was exploding, each particle away from the next, hurtling us into dark and lonely space, eternally tearing us away from each other - child out of the womb, friend away from friend, moving from each other, each through his own pathway tow...
Shit is fucked up when it comes to appearances and women. We’re expected to be hot - but if we are, we’re vain and stupid. And if we’re not hot we’re useless. Kind of hard to get around. But we’re not stupid. We know that we’re doing dama...
Cassandra wondered at the mind's cruel ability to toss up flecks of the past. Why, as she neared her life's end, her grandmother's head should ring with the voices of people long since gone. Was it always this way? Did those with passage booked on de...
There are few experiences in life as painful and brutal as the failure of a small business. For a small business conceived and nurtured by its owner is like a living, breathing child. Its loss is no less traumatic than losing a loved one.
Every Saturday morning, first thing before breakfast, his parents held conferences with their children requiring them to answer two questions put to each of them: 1. What have you learned that is true (and how do you know)? 2. What problem do you hav...
Only later did I come to understand that to be a mother is to be an illusion. No matter how vigilant, in the end a mother can't protect her child - not from pain, or horror, or the nightmare of violence, from sealed trains moving rapidly in the wrong...
My experience is that God will meet us anywhere. Grieving badly and under the covers? He's there. Sitting at the cemetery, wishing it were you? You're not alone. Sitting on your child's bedroom floor still in your nightgown in the middle of the after...
