Clarissa

“Their normal children generally play on the scrubby bit of grass in front of the playground fence, falling over each other like a mass of puppies in racing-green sweatshirts. Evie regards them with disdain, Thomas with envy and fear. He has inherited a double dose of physical ineptitude from his parents and knows he would be killed if he joined in.”
― Lucy Mangan, Are We Having Fun Yet?

“I can rid you of it, you know,' said Ennerast, leaning forward over the blade, pressing her face close to Kissen's. 'This promise, the scars, the memory.' She brushed Kissen's cheek.

'More powerful gods than you have made me offers, Ennerast,' said Kissen, 'and I killed them just the same.”
― Hannah Kaner, Godkiller

“The house is silent now and she feels like a stranger here. “This life was never ours,” she whispers to the dog, who has been following her from room to room, and Luli wags her tail and stares at Miranda with wet brown eyes. “We were only ever borrowing it.”
― Emily St. John Mandel, Station Eleven

“Then she said, "The trouble with humans is that it's all or nothing with them. They seem to think anything impossible could happen in the old days. And just because it's the new days, they tell you none of it is true. Now I'm going to sleep.”
― Diana Wynne Jones, Dogsbody