“Wear pink!' her mother had said. 'It confuses the enemy.”

“The woman wears a floral print blouse with lots of leaves and pink flowers. Risa would like to attack her with a weed whacker.”

“She loved her mother and depended on her mother, and yet every single word her mother said annoyed her.”

“One of Renee's friends asked her, "Does your boyfriend wear glasses?" She said, "No, he wears a Walkman.”

“Confusion to the enemy.”

“She came naturally by her confused and groundless fears, for her own mother lived the latter years of her life in the horrible suspicion that electricity was dripping invisibly all over the house.”

“That's what my mother doesn't understand about my lipstick and dark clothes. I don't wear tattoos to freak her out; I wear them because I have to. It's me.”

“I sure do like the color brown. And pink. Pink and brown. If I had to choose, pink would lose.”

“Confusion to our enemies!”

“How had it begun? Like everything: with mothers and fathers. Because of Lydia’s mother and father, because of her mother’s and father’s mothers and fathers.”