Balancing act Quote by Alice McDermott

“Some vestige of his race or of his sex made him think, whenever he looked out across the ocean: As it was before me…

— Alice McDermott

“If you want to see how far we have not come from the cave and the woods, from the lonely and dangerous days of…

— Alice McDermott

“John Keane pressed his chest to the steering wheel as he put the key in the ignition, taking a deep breath as he did,…

— Alice McDermott

“The fourth contraction seized her and suddenly she was perspiring. She heard herself cry out and then she heard the children’s voices like sparks…

— Alice McDermott

“THE TINY SPIDERS that lived in the higher branches of the downed tree (which now meant the branches that lay on the other side…

— Alice McDermott

What makes a sentence, a phrase, a moment, or a scene delightful? Something about recognizing the truth in it, hearing the music in it,…

— Alice McDermott

“Michael had slipped beyond the crest of the dune. Jacob was lying flat out now, on his stomach, his little men all before him,…

— Alice McDermott

“The wind,” Mary said again. “It was making everyone tear up.”

— Alice McDermott

“Not a soul,” Mary Keane said to her husband, the wind lifting her words, tossing them gently back over her shoulder, the way it…

— Alice McDermott

“There wasn’t a tear to be seen on the faces of the men and women in the street as the two of them walked…

— Alice McDermott

“His love for his children bore down on his heart with the weight of three heavy stones. There were all his unnamed fears for…

— Alice McDermott

“Mr. Persichetti knew that six weeks before its time and with a good thirty-minute ride to the hospital once the ambulance came (would it…

— Alice McDermott