“It felt odd to have interrupted the life of someone she knew nothing about, to kill someone she had only just met, as though killing needed intimacy, deep knowledge of the other, to make it all right.”

“The desire to know the future gnaws at our bones. That is where it started, and might have ended, years ago.I had cast the stones, seeing their faces flicker and fall: Death, Love, Murder, Treachery, Hope. We are a treacherous people - half of our stones show betrayal and violence and death from those close, death from those far away. It is not so with other peoples. I have seen other sets that show only natural disasters: death from sickness, from age, the pain of a broken heart, loss in childbirth. And those stones are more than half full with pleasure and joy and plain, solid warnings like "You reap what you sow" and "Victory is not the same as satisfaction."Of course, we live in a land taken by force, by battle and murder and invasion. It is not so surprising that our stones reflect our history.”

“It felt odd to have interrupted the life of someone she knew nothing about, to kill someone she had only just met, as though killing needed intimacy, deep knowledge of the other, to make it all right.”