“Eleanor: It is a pretty fiction that mothers love each child in equal measure… a fiction, no more than that. There is always a favorite. With me, it was Richard. With Henry, it was you.John: No. I was not his favorite. It was rather that I was the only son he had left. Have you forgotten? My brothers sided with you.”Sharon Kay Penman book Here Be DragonsHere Be Dragons (1985), Book 1
“Eleanor: I'm tired, John, am asking you to keep this charade mercifully brief… for my sake if not for your own.John: For your sake? There was a time when I'd have done anything on God's Earth for you, just to get to acknowledge I was even alive! But now? You're too late, Mother, years too late!”Sharon Kay Penman book Here Be DragonsHere Be Dragons (1985), Book 1
“Servant: My lord! My lord, the Queen has just ridden into the bailey!John: That cannot be! My mother is in Normandy.Servant: No, my lord, she's in the great hall.Eleanor: You both are wrong. I'm out in the stairwell.”Sharon Kay Penman book Here Be DragonsHere Be Dragons (1985), Book 1