Kelsey Brickl said this quote

When some women felt fear, they covered it with an iron grate of courage, I thought. Men might be dangerous, but they were very often unperceptive. If fear only rumbled through a woman’s soul and glittered through her eyes, then perhaps the man she feared would not be aware it was there at all. He might even think that she was entirely confident, dauntless. He might believe her veneer of bravery.

~ Kelsey Brickl

The war dragged on, as wars tend to do.

~ Kelsey Brickl

I was scarcely the first, nor the only current, girl of impressive derivation to be unceremoniously thrust through the iron gate at the entrance of Le Murate by parents whose aspirations for their daughters did not include marriage. Our paths to the convent were varied, but no matter. We all wound up in the same habit.

~ Kelsey Brickl

She was an afterthought, little Martha. She was treated the way many families treated pet dogs - she had to be fed and cleaned every now and then, but she was left to her own devices for the most part.

~ Kelsey Brickl