Where the Crawdads Sing

by Delia Owens

When cornered, desperate, or isolated, man reverts to those instincts that aim straight at survival. Quick and just. They will always be the trump cards because they are passed on more frequently from one generation to the next than the gentler genes. It is not a morality, but simple math. Among themselves, doves fight as often as hawks.

His dad had told him many times that the definition of a real man is one who cries without shame, reads poetry with his heart, feels opera in his soul, and does what’s necessary to defend a woman.

“‘There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot.’”

Faces change with life’s toll, but eyes remain a window to what was, and she could see him there.

She feels the pulse of life, he thought, because there are no layers between her and her planet.

You can’t get hurt when you love someone from the other side of an estuary. All the years she rejected him, she survived because he was somewhere in the marsh, waiting. But now perhaps he would no longer be there.

“I’ve always loved you. Even as a child—in a time I don’t remember—I already loved you.” She dipped her head.