"It was inevitable. One day Silas would run into someone from the past, someone who had been in a position of power and had abused it. Someone who had affected his life, not in the vague, rather grand way in which everybody had been affected, as people said, because power corrupts even the best of men, but directly and brutally." Chapter 1, pg. 3

"He glanced down the slenderness of her back, saw the slow pool of blood spreading on the floor, saw his heavy shoes immersed in its dark glow, saw her feet dancing, delicate little steps, on the jagged edges of the broken beer glass." Chapter 1, pg. 17

"He had not brought her son to visit her, her face said, that was the least she expected of him, and tears flowed down her cheeks. Mikey's absence was bringing out into the open the anger and unhappiness that both of...