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.

Kya laid her hand upon the breathing, wet earth, and the marsh became her mother.

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.

Sand keeps secrets better than mud.

Shells the best secret-keepers of all.

Crows can’t keep secrets any better than mud; once they see something curious in the forest they have to tell everybody. Those who listen are rewarded: either warned of predators or alerted to food.

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

“Well, we better hide way out there where the crawdads sing. I pity any foster parents who take you on.” Tate’s whole face smiled. “What d’ya mean, where the crawdads sing? Ma used to say that.” Kya remembered Ma always encouraging her to explore the marsh: “Go as far as you can—way out yonder where the crawdads sing.” “Just means far in the bush where critters are wild, still behaving like critters. Now, you got any ideas where we can meet?”

Autumn leaves don’t fall; they fly.

Biology sees right and wrong as the same color in different light.

Trapped inside, Love is a caged beast, Eating its own flesh. Love must be free to wander, To land upon its chosen shore And breathe.

She laughed for his sake, something she’d never done. Giving away another piece of herself just to have someone else.

Time speeds and bends around planets and suns, is different in the mountains than in the valleys, and is part of the same fabric as space, which curves and swells as does the sea.

In the mountains, she noticed, the time of sunset depended on where you stood on the hill.

Child to child Eye to eye We grew as one, Sharing souls. Wing by wing, Leaf by leaf You left this world, You died before the child. My friend, the Wild.

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

I have to say I am relieved it is over: At the end I could feel only pity For that urge toward more life. . . . Goodbye.

“I’ve read a lot about this since. In nature—out yonder where the crawdads sing—these ruthless-seeming behaviors actually increase the mother’s number of young over her lifetime, and thus her genes for abandoning offspring in times of stress are passed on to the next generation.

Some behaviors that seem harsh to us now ensured the survival of early man in whatever swamp he was in at the time. Without them, we wouldn’t be here. We still store those instincts in our genes, and they express themselves when certain circumstances prevail.

Let’s face it, a lot of times love doesn’t work out. Yet even when it fails, it connects you to others and, in the end, that is all you have, the connections.

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

Who decides the time to die?

Leaning on someone leaves you on the ground.

“Never underrate the heart, Capable of deeds The mind cannot conceive. The heart dictates as well as feels. How else can you explain The path I have taken, That you have taken The long way through this pass?”