Cinderella Is Dead Quotes

Do not be silent. Raise your voice. Be a light in the dark.

I don't want to be saved by some knight in shining armour. I'd like to be the one in the armour, and I'd like to be the one doing the saving.

It's risky...But sometimes that's the only way to get things done. Take the risk, light the fuse. Onward.

I think sometimes we make the mistake of thinking monsters are abhorrent aberrations, lurking in the darkest recesses, when the truth is far more disturbing. The most monstrous men are those who sit in plain sight, daring you to challenge them.

The palace underestimates the resourcefulness of women forced into a dark and dangerous place.

Look at your children, your friends, your wives, and your daughters. Don't do what is right because they hold those titles. Do what is right because they are people.

That you try to flatter me when I have a blade at your neck makes me want to slit your throat and spare the world your ignorance.

And you're not lost?" "Maybe I am. But the difference is that I want to be found. I'm not happy pretending everything is fine when I know it's not." "And just who is it that you suppose will find you?" "It'll be me. I will find myself.

We are all trapped here, our stories already written.

The pockets,” she says. She puts her hands in them and gives a little twirl. “I love pockets.

You will hear people speak of light and dark, but in my experience you must be well versed in both to find a balance.

Have you ever heard of a man marrying another man? A woman being in love with another woman? Of people who find their hearts lie somewhere in the middle or with neither?

Be a light in the dark.

The truth is tricky. People want to know it, but when they do, sometimes they wish they didn’t.

You weren't selfish. You saw a future for yourself that she couldn't imagine. You wanted her to believe that the two of you could find a way through all this. That's what happens when you care about someone. And when you're brave enough to imagine a different life.

We’ve also rarely heard about people like us and yet here we are. Just because they deny us doesn’t mean we cease to exist.

That a girl is considered a spinster if not married by eighteen is wrong, and that the boys don’t even have to attend the ball until they want to is a sickening double standard.

When the leader of this kingdom treats women as property, it sets an awful precedent. People think it’s okay to do the same.

Be very careful what you ask for. Because you just might get it.

My path has been chosen for me since birth. My future is already written, and I don’t have a say in any of it.

Cinderella has been dead for two hundred years. I’ve been in love with Erin for the better part of three years. And I am about two minutes away from certain death.

He says that woman speaks with nature. That she hears voices from under the earth. That wind blows in her ears and trees whisper to her. That the dead sing through her mouth and the cries of infants are clear to her. But for him this dialogue is over. He says he is not part of this world, that he was set on this world as a stranger. He sets himself apart from woman and nature. And so it is Goldilocks who goes to the home of the three bears, Little Red Riding Hood who converses with the wolf, Dorothy who befriends a lion, Snow White who talks to the birds, Cinderella with mice as her allies, the Mermaid who is half fish, Thumbelina courted by a mole. (And when we hear in the Navaho chant of the mountain that a grown man sits and smokes with bears and follows directions given to him by squirrels, we are surprised. We had thought only little girls spoke with animals.) We are the bird's eggs. Bird's eggs, flowers, butterflies, rabbits, cows, sheep; we are caterpillars; we are leaves of ivy and sprigs of wallflower. We are women. We rise from the wave. We are gazelle and doe, elephant and whale, lilies and roses and peach, we are air, we are flame, we are oyster and pearl, we are girls. We are woman and nature. And he says he cannot hear us speak. But we hear.

People wear masks so that they can fit in and stay safe. Can you blame them?

I was twelve when I told my parents that I would much rather find a princess than a prince. They had gone into a state of panic, from which they emerged with a renewed sense of determination. They told me that in order to survive I would have to hide how I felt. I was never very good at it, and the weight of that mask grows heavier with each passing year. I want nothing more than to cast it aside.

I don't dare tell him that once while I sat in her lap she told me that if I ever went to the ball, I should set the place on fire and dance on the ashes.

People who don't fit nicely into the boxes the kings of Mersailles have defined are simply erased, as if our lives don't matter.

You can keep your girls from harm. And more important, they can be allowed to keep themselves from harm [...] Look at your children, your friends, your wives, your daughters. Don't do what is right because they hold those titles. Do what is right because they are people. Make a choice to change things.

My mother taught me that I am a whole person with or without a husband,” she says emphatically. “Who I am inside and how I treat others are the only things that matter. The same goes for you. Don’t let anybody tell you different.

Some people think they are chosen, destined to be great, and do you know what happens while they are basking in the possibility of their own greatness?" "I don't know," I say. She narrows her eyes at me. "What happens is that someone with no particular preordained purpose puts their head down, works hard, and makes something happen out of sheer will.

Imagine this: Instead of waiting in her tower, Rapunzel slices off her long, golden hair with a carving knife, and then uses it to climb down to freedom. Just as she’s about to take the poison apple, Snow White sees the familiar wicked glow in the old lady’s eyes, and slashes the evil queen’s throat with a pair of sewing scissors. Cinderella refuses everything but the glass slippers from her fairy godmother, crushes her stepmother’s windpipe under her heel, and the Prince falls madly in love with the mysterious girl who dons rags and blood-stained slippers. Imagine this: Persephone goes adventuring with weapons hidden under her dress. Persephone climbs into the gaping chasm. Or, Persephone uses her hands to carve a hole down to hell. In none of these versions is Persephone’s body violated unless she asks Hades to hold her down with his horse-whips. Not once does she hold out on eating the pomegranate, instead biting into it eagerly and relishing the juice running down her chin, staining it red. In some of the stories, Hades never appears and Persephone rules the underworld with a crown of her own making. In all of them, it is widely known that the name Persephone means Bringer of Destruction. Imagine this: Red Riding Hood marches from her grandmother’s house with a bloody wolf pelt. Medusa rights the wrongs that have been done to her. Eurydice breaks every muscle in her arms climbing out of the land of the dead. Imagine this: Girls are allowed to think dark thoughts, and be dark things. Imagine this: Instead of the dragon, it’s the princess with claws and fiery breath who smashes her way from the confines of her castle and swallows men whole.

I'm lost in the tide of her breathing, the sweet smell of her skin, the push and pull of our bodies against each other...

Happiness is a bonus, Sophia. You’re not entitled to it, and the sooner you accept that, the easier your life will be.

Take the risk, light the fuse. Onward.

I wonder how he manages to do that, to make something so terrible seem so inviting. This isn't a dream; it is a nightmare made real, and there is no waking up.

For all his cruelty, he is a highly intelligent man,” Amina says. “I think we sometimes make the mistake of thinking monsters are abhorrent aberrations, lurking in the darkest recesses, when the truth is far more disturbing. The most monstrous of men are those who sit in plain sight, daring you to challenge them. He’s calculating and manipulative, and believe me when I say he will not stop until he finds you.

Little girls are taught fairy tales that are filled with magic. Cinderella is taught to wait in the kitchen for a guy with the right shoe! Snow White is given the message that if she waits long enough, her prince will come. On a literal level, that story tells women that their destiny depends on waiting for a necrophile (someone who likes to kiss dead people) to stumble through the woods at the right time. Not a pretty picture!

My first thought is to alert the merchant, but when he makes a comment about the length of a young girl’s skirt and how her legs are simply too inviting to resist, I stop in my tracks. He deserves to have his things stolen.

I smack into him as if shoved from behind. He doesn't budge, not an inch. Just holds my shoulders and waits. Maybe he's waiting for me to find my balance. Maybe he's waiting for me to gather my pride. I hope he's got all day. I hear people passing on the boardwalk and imagine them staring. Best-case scenario, they think I know this guy, that we're hugging. Worst-case scenario, they saw me totter like an intoxicated walrus into this complete stranger because I was looking down for a place to park our beach stuff. Either way, he knows what happened. He knows why my cheek is plastered to his bare chest. And there is definite humiliation waiting when I get around to looking up at him. Options skim through my head like a flip book. Option One: Run away as fast as my dollar-store flip flops can take me. Thing is, tripping over them is partly responsible for my current dilemma. In fact, one of them is missing, probably caught in a crack of the boardwalk. I'm getting Cinderella didn't feel this foolish, but then again, Cinderella wasn't as clumsy as an intoxicated walrus. Option two: Pretend I've fainted. Go limp and everything. Drool, even. But I know this won't work because my eyes flutter too much to fake it, and besides, people don't blush while unconscious. Option Three: Pray for a lightning bolt. A deadly one that you feel in advance because the air gets all atingle and your skin crawls-or so the science books say. It might kill us both, but really, he should have been paying more attention to me when he saw that I wasn't paying attention at all. For a shaved second, I think my prayers are answered because I go get tingly all over; goose bumps sprout everywhere, and my pulse feels like electricity. Then I realize, it's coming from my shoulders. From his hands. Option Last: For the love of God, peel my cheek off his chest and apologize for the casual assault. Then hobble away on my one flip-flop before I faint. With my luck, the lightning would only maim me, and he would feel obligated to carry me somewhere anyway. Also, do it now. I ease away from him and peer up. The fire on my cheeks has nothing to do with the fact that it's sweaty-eight degrees in the Florida sun and everything to do with the fact that I just tripped into the most attractive guy on the planet. Fan-flipping-tastic. "Are-are you all right?" he says, incredulous. I think I can see the shape of my cheek indented on his chest. I nod. "I'm fine. I'm used to it. Sorry." I shrug off his hands when he doesn't let go. The tingling stays behind, as if he left some of himself on me. "Jeez, Emma, are you okay?" Chloe calls from behind. The calm fwopping of my best friend's sandals suggests she's not as concerned as she sounds. Track star that she is, she would already be at my side if she thought I was hurt. I groan and face her, not surprised that she's grinning wide as the equator. She holds out my flip-flop, which I try not to snatch from her hand. "I'm fine. Everybody's fine," I say. I turn back to the guy, who seems to get more gorgeous by the second. "You're fine, right? No broken bones or anything?" He blinks, gives a slight nod. Chloe setts her surfboard against the rail of the boardwalk and extends her hand to him. He accepts it without taking his eyes off me. "I'm Chloe and this is Emma," she says. "We usually bring her helmet with us, but we left it back in the hotel room this time.

The heels of the glittering monstrosities are nearly five inches tall, and the toes are so pointed that a normal human foot could never fill its proportions. “Am I supposed to wear those?” I ask. “Obviously,” my mother says. I’m reminded that this isn’t about what I want or what I like. It’s about what everyone else thinks is best, and I’m not sure how much more of this I can take.

My father is a good man liv's father is a good man, and even Luke's father seems like a good man. But these good men aren't making the rules. These decent men are turning a blind eye to indecent acts. "If you're not one of the men who would jump at the first chance to put a woman in her place, then I'm not talking about you

be saved by some knight in shining armor. I’d like to be the one in the armor, and I’d like to be the one doing the saving.

She shouldn’t be suffering, and neither should I. It is this feeling that strengthens my resolve to do whatever must be done

The truth is tricky. People want to know it, but when they do, sometimes they wish they didn't.

Fais très attention à ce que tu demandes. Parce que tu pourrais bien l’obtenir.

I think we need to burn the whole thing to the ground and start over. The entire system, the ideals that have been woven into this society. It all has to go.

He scratches the top of his head. He is completely confused. “Do you even know how to use a sword? Women aren’t permitted to—” “The pointy end goes in your neck,” Constance snaps.

There is always fear, always doubt... The only thing that matters is that you push forward. And seeing as how that's exactly what you're doing, I would ask you to recognize that you are worthy of this task.

What effect do the fairy tales we are told as children have on us? What happens to our view of the world when the characters in these stories don’t look like us or love like us? When do we get to be the heroes of our stories?

can do it. Any head of household could. The only person who can disagree is another head of household. Money, power, class, all those things come into play, but the founding tenet of our laws is that women, no matter their standing, are at the mercy of the fickle whims of men.

Let Cinderella’s truth stand as a testament to her persistence and her bravery even in the face of oppression. Understand that what King Manford, in all his incarnations, feared the most was the will of the people he so desperately wanted to control. Do not be silent. Raise your voice. Be a light in the dark.

Just outside the palace grounds is the gated section of Eastern Lille, where the highest-ranking members of the aristocracy live. Close enough to the king to make themselves feel special but far enough away so they didn’t get the impression they were equal to him. The people there hoarded their wealth, improving their own lives while the rest of the city fell into decay.

We put you in a position to succeed in finding a good match. You could have wooed the king himself. You would have been chosen by someone.” My father rubs his forehead, squeezing his eyes closed. “You don’t even know what happened up there! It was worse than anything I could have imagined. Some of those men were older than Grandpa, and some of them were looking for two girls at a time.

Evil things happen, and good things happen, and in neither physics nor religion is there an explanation that makes any kind of sense. When the world decides to hurt, there’s no way around it, no magical words that will save the day or turn back time and bring the dead to life. There’s no such thing as fate, or, wickedness, or girls who can be princesses and girls who can’t. There’s only person, and we all do the best we can.

Her whole childhood, she'd devoured stories of children with dead and missing mothers, often easier to find than stories of children whose mothers were alive and well. The absence of a mother was a promise of adventure; mothers made things too safe, too comforting. Children with mothers didn't need to look outside their homes for affirmation of their supremacy in someone's story. They didn't need to write their own protagonism. Esther remembered Cecily complaining about this when they'd watched The Little Mermaid, Cinderella, and Snow White, offended by the lack of loving birth mothers and the prevalence of monstrous stepmothers. She'd squeezed Esther tight and smeared her cheek with red kisses and said, 'This evil stepmother loves you very much.' But despite Cecily's love, which Esther had never doubted, she had already identified within herself the same motherless quality that drove Ariel to shore, Cinderella to the ball, Snow White into the forest. Her motherlessness was intrinsic to her sense of self, and her sense of self was all she had these many years alone. What would it mean if her mother was alive? Not only alive, but aware of Esther and watching out for her, passing notes through magic mirrors and protecting her from afar, her own fairy godmother. What would it mean if her mother had not died, but left her?

During a famine, the father and stepmother of Hansel and Gretel abandon them in a forest so that they will starve to death. The children stumble upon an edible house inhabited by a witch, who imprisons Hansel and fattens him up in preparation for eating him. Fortunately Gretel shoves the witch into a fiery oven, and “the godless witch burned to death in a horrible way.” 41 • Cinderella’s stepsisters, when trying to squeeze into her slippers, take their mother’s advice and cut off a toe or heel to make them fit. Doves notice the blood, and after Cinderella marries the prince, they peck out the stepsisters’ eyes, punishing them “for their wickedness and malice with blindness for the rest of their lives.” Snow White arouses the jealousy of her stepmother, the queen, so the queen orders a hunter to take her into the forest, kill her, and bring back her lungs and liver for the queen to eat. When the queen realizes that Snow White has escaped, she makes three more attempts on her life, two by poison, one by asphyxiation. After the prince has revived her, the queen crashes their wedding, but “iron slippers had already been heated up for her over a fire of coals.... She had to put on the red-hot iron shoes and dance in them until she dropped to the ground dead.

Didn’t you ever notice that whatever you wanted or whatever you set out to do, Cora wanted to do it too?” Noah asked. “She wasn’t like that.” “She was, Mer. And it’s okay to admit it. One of the hardest things about Cora dying is that everyone wants to erase her—the real Cora. They talk about her as though she were perfect. She wasn’t. ‘Don’t talk ill of the dead,’ people say. But if we aren’t truthful about who our loved ones were, then we aren’t really remembering them. We’re creating someone who didn’t exist. Cora loved you. She loved me. But what she did was not okay. And I’m pissed off about it.” Mercedes reeled back, stunned. “Geez, Noah. Tell me how you really feel. She still deserves our compassion,” she rebuked. He nodded. “Everyone deserves compassion. And I know suicide isn’t always a conscious act. Most of the time it’s sheer desperation. It’s a moment of weakness that we can’t come back from. But regardless of illness or weakness, if we don’t own our actions and don’t demand that others own theirs, then what’s the point? We might as well give up now. We have to expect better of ourselves. We have to. I expect more of my patients, and when I expect more—lovingly, patiently—they tend to rise to that expectation. Maybe not all the way up, but they rise. They improve because I believe they can, and I believe they must. My mom was sick. But she didn’t try hard enough to get better. She found a way to cope—and that’s important—but she never varied from it. Life has to be more than coping. It has to be.” Mercedes nodded slowly, her eyes clinging to his impassioned face. She’d struck a nerve, and he wasn’t finished. “I know it’s not something we’re supposed to say. We’re supposed to be all-loving and all-compassionate all the time. But sometimes the things we aren’t supposed to say are the truths that keep us sane, that tether us to reality, that help us move the hell on! I know some of my colleagues would be shocked to hear it. But pressure—whether it’s the pressure of society, or the pressure of responsibility, or the pressure that comes with being loved and being needed—isn’t always a bad thing. You’ve heard the cliché about pressure and diamonds. It’s a cliché because it’s true. Pressure sometimes begets beautiful things.” Mercedes was silent, studying his handsome face, his tight shoulders, and his clenched fists. He was weary, that much was obvious, but he wasn’t wrong. “Begets?” she asked, a twinkle in her eye. He rolled his eyes. “You know damn well what beget means.” “In the Bible, beget means to give birth to. I wouldn’t mind giving birth to a diamond,” she mused. “You ruin all my best lectures.” There was silence from the kitchen. Silence was not good. “Gia?” Noah called. “What, Daddy?” she answered sweetly. “Are you pooping in your new princess panties?” “No. Poopin’ in box.” “What box?” His voice rose in horror. “Kitty box.” Noah was on his feet, racing toward the kitchen. Mercedes followed. Gia was naked—her Cinderella panties abandoned in the middle of the floor—and perched above the new litter box. “No!” Noah roared in horror, scooping her up and marching to the toilet. “Maybe it won’t be a turd, Noah. Maybe Gia will beget a diamond,” Mercedes chirped, trying not to laugh. “I blame you, Mer!” he called from the bathroom. “She was almost potty-trained, and now she wants to be a cat!

You forget one other thing, Father,” I said. “Dmitriv thinks balls are deadly dull. Can you expect him to fall in love at the equivalent of one of your Council meetings?”... Father stamped his fist on the table and pushed himself up. His moustache was bristling—he did not often take kindly to my poking holes in his schemes. “You forget, dear daughter,” he roared after me, “deadly dull places are best to distract oneself with a love affair! Why else would balls have worked for all these centuries, eh?

My reflection smiles, unworried. It’s a new life now, new enemies to conquer. The old Cinderella is dead, she died the moment I plunged that spike into Stepmother. No longer will I subjugate myself to anyone, no longer will I take refuge in my memories of Papa. Try as I might, I no longer see myself as his daughter. Not just because of my mother’s secret, but because I’ve taken a life. Somehow, that pushed my father far away, beyond my reach. I have no family left, no real identity. I will have to create it for myself. My

You’ll be taken up to the palace in chains if you’re caught driving a carriage, and if you go walking alone you might end up in a far worse situation.

An insidious little smile spreads across Amina’s lips. “It won’t do you much good. It’s not the wolves or bears you should be afraid of. The night creatures, the ones with no name who come alive in the moonlight—those are the things you should be worried about.

but the founding tenet of our laws is that women, no matter their standing, are at the mercy of the fickle whims of men.

Some people think they are chosen, destined to be great, and do you know what happens while they are basking in the possibility of their own greatness?” “I don’t know,” I say. She narrows her eyes at me. “What happens is that someone with no particular preordained purpose puts their head down, works hard, and makes something happen out of sheer will. That’s where we fall.

And then I want a big hug from all of you while we watch that Disney movie with that person who’s stuck working and working and working, and then they realise they can live out their dreams instead.” “Cinderella?” Mateo guessed and I shook my head with a frown. “You know the one. Where they get to go out at night doing all the things they really want to do, but they can’t tell anyone.” “The Incredibles?” Mateo guessed again. “Nooo.” I threw my head back against the cushion behind me with a huff. “Oh, you mean American Psycho,” Niall realised and I perked up. “Yes! That one. With the stabby man living his dreams,” I said with a grin.

I don’t want to be saved by some knight in shining armor. I’d like to be the one in the armor, and I’d like to be the one doing the saving.

The most monstrous of men are those who sit in plain sight, daring you to challenge them.

There is always fear, always doubt,” Amina says. “The only thing that matters is that you push forward. And seeing as how that’s exactly what you’re doing, I would ask you to recognize that you are worthy of this task.

If she had ever picked up a sword, she would have been both deadly and beautiful

Dead or alive, everyone needs someone to love, someone to feel with your heart when you close your eyes at night. It’s

You heard me. Home at the stroke of twelve and not a second later.” “What time is it now? Nearly ten?” “That gives you two wonderful hours to win the prince’s heart. Good luck!” “Why? Why midnight?” Godnutter glowers at me. “Let’s just say I’ve noticed your evenings with men run a lot later than I approve of. I don’t want you misbehaving with this prince. And if you’re thinking of disobeying me,” she wags the pipe stem at me, “I have set the spell so everything that’s been enchanted will turn back to it’s true form at midnight. Even the things you put white magic on! You’ll have nothing but a pumpkin, two rats, a mouse, and a dowdy dress. So watch the clock or it could get quite embarrassing!” I slam the door shut. “Drop dead, Godnutter!” I shout as the carriage begins to roll. “I already did that!” she calls after me, following it with her nasty cackle. I look back and the spot where she stood is now vacant. But her crazy laugh lingers, chasing me into the night.

Our prince, you see, was married before. He had a sweet, smiling wife with shiny black hair and I hated her. And then she did the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me: she dropped dead.

They told me that in order to survive I would have to hide how I felt. I was never very good at it, and the weight of that mask grows heavier with each passing year. I want nothing more than to cast it aside.

It matters to me,” I say. “As hard as the king tries to make us nameless, we aren’t.

But I allow myself to think of what it would be like to spend my days with her freely, in a future we create.

Then again, when he’d told her of Felicity, he’d seen the most extraordinary change come over her. She’d always looked at him with interest and amusement. This had been different. She’d looked at him as if she might respect him. If she does, she’s a bloody fool. He’d taken in Felicity, but only out of spite for the type of parents who’d raised him. Gregory hated seeing a child tossed aside as not being good enough. He knew that pain himself only too well. Still, raising a child out of spite for people who were long dead wasn’t the act of a good man. Goodness had been incidental.

Neither have I, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. We’ve also rarely heard about people like us and yet here we are. Just because they deny us doesn’t mean we cease to exist.

Cinderella is taught to wait in the kitchen for a guy with the right shoe! Snow White is given the message that if she waits long enough, her prince will come. On a literal level, that story tells women that their destiny depends on waiting for a necrophile (someone who likes to kiss dead people) to stumble through the woods at the right time. Not a pretty picture!

One Headlight" So long ago, I don't remember when That's when they say I lost my only friend Well they said she died easy of a broken heart disease As I listened through the cemetery trees I seen the sun coming up at the funeral at dawn The long broken arm of human law Now it always seemed such a waste She always had a pretty face So I wondered how she hung around this place Hey, come on try a little Nothing is forever There's got to be something better than In the middle But me and Cinderella We put it all together We can drive it home With one headlight She said it's cold It feels like Independence Day And I can't break away from this parade But there's got to be an opening Somewhere here in front of me Through this maze of ugliness and greed And I seen the sun up ahead At the county line bridge Saying all is good and nothingness is dead We'd run until she's out of breath She ran until there's nothing left She hit the end, it's just her window ledge Hey, come on try a little Nothing is forever There's got to be something better than In the middle But me and Cinderella We put it all together We can drive it home With one headlight This place is old It feels just like a beat up truck I turn the engine, but the engine doesn't turn What smells of cheap wine and cigarettes This place is always such a mess Sometimes I think I'd like to watch it burn I'm so alone, I feel just like somebody else Man, I ain't changed, but I know I ain't the same But somewhere here in between the city walls of dying dreams I think her death it must be killing me Hey Hey Hey, come on try a little Nothing is forever There's got to be something better than In the middle But me and Cinderella We put it all together We can drive it home With one headlight The Wallflowers, Bringing Down the Horse (1996)

it feel like another part of me is being changed to fit someone else's vision of what is pretty.

i am left just as i am, and after all this time. i know it is enough.

Our prince, you see, was married before. He had a sweet, smiling wife with shiny black hair and I hated her. And then she did the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me: she dropped dead. Clunk, just like that.

Oh, everything! The place where it happened, and the weapon, and the body, and any finger-prints or interesting things like that. I’ve never had a chance of being right in on a murder like this before. It’ll last me all my life?” I turned away, sickened. What were women coming to nowadays? The girl’s ghoulish excitement nauseated me. I had read of the mobs of women who besieged the law courts when some wretched man was being tried for his life on the capital charge. I had sometimes wondered who these women were. Now I knew. They were of the likeness of Cinderella, young, yet obsessed with a yearning for morbid excitement, for sensation at any price, without regard to any decency or good feeling. The vividness of the girl’s beauty had attracted me in spite of myself, yet at heart I retained my first impression of disapproval and dislike. I thought of my mother, long since dead. What would she have said of this strange modern product of girlhood? The pretty face with the paint and powder, and the ghoulish mind behind!

our most basic myth would seem to be not Oedipus’s patricide, but matricide and violence against women. Where is Cinderella’s mother, and where is Little Red Riding Hood’s grandmother? The philosopher Julia Kristeva has explained the drive toward matricide as a kind of original, generative anger, expressing a need to destroy the mother, the origin place, to become an individual self. This is messier than an Oedipal reading of history, as the will to matricide is born in confusion and creates only chaos. As Nelson explains, the maternal element returns “via horror, repulsion, the uncanny, haunting, melancholia, depression, guilt.

I spent nine years living in a graveyard of dead dreams, pretending it was Cinderella's castle. If that's not sad enough to cry over, I don't know what is.

A prison is still a prison no matter how pretty the decor,” says Constance.

We all make choices that we wish we could take back. But we can’t change what has already happened. The only thing we can do is try to make things better now.

I think we sometimes make the mistake of thinking monsters are abhorrent aberrations, lurking in the darkest recesses, when the truth is far more disturbing. The most monstrous of men are those who sit in plain sight, daring you to challenge them.

I swallow hard. I drank a half vial of cow piss and gave Erin the rest. That is a secret I’ll be taking to my grave.

I fell asleep then and never heard the ending to the story. In the morning, my mother was dead. The physician said she had passed in her sleep from the fever that we both had fought against the whole week.