“Sometimes the smoke from the factories and riverboats and trains would obscure the night sky entirely. But the town's industrial breath was blowing somewhere else tonight, and so the Armstrong house was bathed in starlight. Nell studied the little white… — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“Praying to the Almighty, Javert?” called a voice, and Javert opened his eyes to see Rousseau and Leclerc smirking at him. Javert tipped his head and said to the others, "If I was, it would be awfully rude to interrupt my prayer, don’t you think? But, no, Leclerc. I find no solace in speaking with an imaginary puppeteer.” Rousseau, who… — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share
“He was an indecent man, I told myself - prayerfully - and then I prayed for him to become decent.” — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“She parted her lips as though she were going to scold him, but, after a moment of sitting with her mouth agape like a… — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“When some women felt fear, they covered it with an iron grate of courage, I thought. Men might be dangerous, but they were very often unperceptive. If fear only rumbled through a woman’s soul and glittered through her eyes, then perhaps the man she feared would not be aware it was there at all. He might even think that she… — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share
“Thus, in the boy’s mind, drink and destruction braided together. Intoxication, he concluded, was a swift and effective catalyst for havoc.” — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“The ground had opened up and spit out hell, Nell thought, and the detritus was Shiloh.” — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“Sometimes a revolution turns into an actual government, or at the very least an actual way of life that contrasts with days past like blood on snow. Such was the case in France, where even as the guillotine released a steady river of gore, Royalist insurrections were suppressed by what had become a sophisticated military. In Toulon, the Royalist insurrection… — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share
“Fire on the cavalry!” cried an officer from behind them. Javert raised his musket and glared with one open eye at the approaching horde.… — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“There was no justice in rebellion. This Javert had come to believe after seeing Marseille fall headfirst into the abyss of the revolution.” — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“In August, an inescapable blanket of heat settled over Paducah, the last gasping breath of summer roaring its weight out over the populace.” — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“It wasn’t that Nell was weak. It was that the world was dangerous.” — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
“She was an afterthought, little Martha. She was treated the way many families treated pet dogs - she had to be fed and cleaned… — Kelsey Brickl Copy Share Image
