I said that the greatest female writers, with almost no exceptions, have been childless. A fact. And I have said that women generally, by virtue of t… - Robert Galbraith

The dead could only speak through the mouths of those left behind, and through the signs they left scattered behind them.

"She wuz depressed. Yeah, she wuz on stuff for it. Like me. Sometimes it jus' takes you over. It's an illness," she said, although she made the words sound like "it's uh nillness."

Nillness, thought Strike, for a second distracted. He had slept badly. Nillness, that was where Lula Landry had gone, and where all of them, he and Rochelle included, were headed. Sometimes illness turned slowly to nillness, as was happening to Bristow's mother... sometimes nillness rose to meet you out of nowhere, like a concrete road slamming your skull apart.

In spite of her plainness that would have made wallflowers of other women, she radiated a great sense of self-importance.