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1 " By journey's end the brides were much better acquainted with their grooms and more or less pleased with the matches. Sybil Bingham wrote in her diary, thanking God for answering her prayer for filling " the void" with a husband like Hiram, a " treasure rich and undeserved." Having read his insufferable memoir, " A Residence of Twenty-one Years in the Sandwich Islands" , all I can say is: I'm happy for her? "
2 " Language, when it finally comes, has the vigor of a felon pardoned after twenty-one years on hold. Sudden, raw, stripped to its underwear. "
― Toni Morrison , Love
3 " Around the time my first marriage of twenty-one years was ending, I had spent a lot of time reflecting on the fairytale promises of living " happily ever after and being " forever in love." I thought about how the expectations of our families, friends, religion and society each contribute to the guilt and shame many of us experience when our partnerships and marriages do not work out the way we expected. The familiar promises of being together until death do us part" seemed antiquated and misguided in our modern world. Why wan't being happy, in love and committed 'for now' a more widely accepted and reasonable vision? "
4 " Detective Inspector Carver took a picture from the breast pocket of his suit. He handed it to me. ‘This is what you did, Michael. Take a good look. See if it jogs your memory.’I gawped at the mutilated corpse of a naked young girl lying on a blood-soaked double bed. Her hands were bound to the brass headboard with duct tape. Blood covered her upper body, and her long blonde hair was streaked a murderous shade of red. One eye stared at the ceiling as if searching for salvation, the other, a bloody unrecognisable pulp, bore no relation to its sightless counterpart. ‘Carla Marie Coombs. Twenty-one years of age. Do you recognise her, Michael? "
― Mark Tilbury , The Abattoir of Dreams
