Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms ...
She turned back to Jace. "Do you have to be so-," she began, but stopped when she saw his face. It looked stripped down, oddly vulnerable. "Unpleasant?" he finishes for her. "Only at days when my adoptive mother tosses me out of the house with instru...
Religions are, by definition, metaphors, after all: God is a dream, a hope, a woman, an ironist, a father, a city, a house of many rooms, a watchmaker who left his prize chronometer in the desert, someone who loves you - even, perhaps, against all ev...
This social worker lassie turns round n gies us a stroppy look. Ah jist smiles bit she looked away aw fuckin nippy likes. Disnae cost nowt tae be social. A social worker thit cannae be fuckin social; that's nae good tae nae cunt, thon. Like a lifegua...
As he paid the hansom and followed his wife's long train into the house he took refuge in the comforting platitude that the first six months were always the most difficult in marriage. 'After that I suppose we shall have pretty nearly finished rubbin...
To protest about bullfighting in Spain, the eating of dogs in South Korea, or the slaughter of baby seals in Canada while continuing to eat eggs from hens who have spent their lives crammed into cages, or veal from calves who have been deprived of th...
Love reduces the complexity of living. It amazes me that when Henry walks towards the cafe table where I wait for him, or opens the gate to our house, the sight of him is sufficient to exult me. No letter from anyone, even in praise of my book, can s...
Real mothers don't just listen with humble embarrassment to the elderly lady who offers unsolicited advice in the checkout line when a child is throwing a tantrum. We take the child, dump him in the lady's cart, and say, "Great. Maybe you can do a be...
I fell asleep. But later that night I woke up. There was moonlight coming through the window, and shadows of tree branches fell onto the bed, waving gently in the breeze." "And then you saw the ghost?" James laughed. "Dear chap, the branches WERE the...
As she turned left to the gateway, it occurred to her that swimming was only one of a very large number of things she had no idea what to do. Peter had been right to object to her ignorance. "It's not that I'm lazy," she explained to Waif as they arr...
That's how it was on Irving Circle and how I was raised: You made the best out of what was within reach, which meant friendships engineered by parents and by the happenstance of housing. I stayed with it because we both had queenly older sisters who ...
As the kids dance around the front yard under the night sky and the lights, I see something. Lua and Marie are holding hands. They look like they're so happy, just inside this moment, watching the kids and the lights on their old fibro house. Lua kis...
He disliked tears, he has always disliked tears, had never understood them, and sometimes lost his temper over them; but he felt now that he could not rebuke this flower of his life, this innocent form, water and youth are inseparable companions, and...
Your house, being the place in which you read, can tell us the position books occupy in your life, if they are a defense you set up to keep the outside world at a distance, if they area dream into which you sink as if into a drug, or bridges you cast...
You probably think that being a guest in your aunt's house I would hesitate to butter you all over the front lawn and dance on the fragments in hobnailed boots, but you are mistaken. It would be a genuine pleasure. By an odd coincidence I brought a p...
This is the best night of my life," Raffy says, crying. "Raffy, half our House has burnt down," I say wearily. "We don't have a kitchen." "Why do you always have to be so pessimistic?" she asks. "We can double up in our rooms and have a barbecue ever...
The notion of children makes me ill. The thought of having one... when you see those guys in the supermarket, wheeling the trolley around while their brats whine and wheedle and some blundering sow questions every little thing they take off the shelv...
Life is funny sometimes. Of course it isn’t as funny as smashing your brand new Mustang convertible into your house and having your life flash before your eyes. Sitting here in my car in the middle of my den, I can't help but think that things coul...
Sarra looked at her daughter and said reproachfully, "Speaking of war, I never raised you to be always fighting and killing. That's not woman's work." "It's needful, Ma. You taught me a woman has to know how to defend herself." "I never!" gasped Sarr...
But I’m old now and Ward has made himself rich and powerful. He has the resources to ensure that one day he’ll perfect his standardising system and if that happens, instead of a thousand Wards there will be a hundred thousand, a million, a billio...
I am going to sit here in the river. If you go home to sleep, I will sleep in front of your house. And if you go away, I will follow you--until you tell me to go away. Then I'll leave. But I have to love you for the rest of my life..
