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This is another one of those cases where I really wish I could give half-stars on this site -- I'd give "Mercy" a 3.5, as I did like it better than other book she's written that I rated a three, but it's definitely my least favorite of all the ones she's put out that include some legal conundrum in the plot. Looking at her publications list, I guess I'm not surprised to see it's one of her earlier works.
A number of characters were really unlikeable, and I wasn't feeling the Carrymuir bits. They seemed superfluous.
Quotes/Parts I liked:
You simply could not define freedom to someone who did not realize they were caged.
*
"Then you're the one."
Allie blinked at him. "The one what?"
"The one who loves more." He moved closer to the desk, and the handcuffs tapped against the metal edge as he inadvertently made gestures. "You know it's never fifty-fifty in a marriage. It's always seventy-thirty, or sixty-forty. Someone falls in love first. Someone puts someone else up on a pedestal. Someone works very hard to keep things rolling smoothly; someone else sails along for the ride."
*
"Do you know what it's like," she said, " to know that the only way you can be happy is if you make everyone else's life miserable?"
*
Innocence looked lovely on her.
*
When I asked him if there was anything he hadn't had a chance to tell Maggie, he nodded. "That she was wrong," he said. "When we talked about it, she said it would be better to remember her as the woman she was than the woman she had become. But the truth is, now I have neither."
*
"I don't know about Jamie, but I understand doing something you know you shouldn't be doing, and knowing at the same time it's not wrong."
*
... he didn't much see how the punishment would differ: a life sentence that made the limits of your world a prison, or the prison your world became when your sentence was simply to live.
*
She wasn't thinking, What did I do to deserve this? She was wondering instead, What did you do to deserve me?
*
Allie remembered once hearing a song that said the first person you fell in love with stole your heart. The first person you made love with stole your soul. And if these were one and the same, you were damned.
*
"You can't judge the deed unless you consider the context in which it was acted out. You can't consider reason and consequence unless you also figure in emotions and morality. Nobody lives, or acts, in a vacuum."
*
"How did you do it?" he asked, his voice thick. "How did you make yourself let her go?"
Jamie wouldn't meet his eye. "I just sort of accepted the fact that it would kill me a little bit every day for the rest of my life."
*
He realized he thought of jail and dying the same way: you were just gone. It didn't really matter exactly where you went.
*
"It's very strange to talk about love at a trial like this. More often, you hear about hate. Hate drove him to take out a rifle and gun down all the people on the Long Island Railroad. Hate drove him to set a bomb in a London pub. It's clearly believable to us that hate can spur a person to action. Why not love?"
A number of characters were really unlikeable, and I wasn't feeling the Carrymuir bits. They seemed superfluous.
Quotes/Parts I liked:
You simply could not define freedom to someone who did not realize they were caged.
*
"Then you're the one."
Allie blinked at him. "The one what?"
"The one who loves more." He moved closer to the desk, and the handcuffs tapped against the metal edge as he inadvertently made gestures. "You know it's never fifty-fifty in a marriage. It's always seventy-thirty, or sixty-forty. Someone falls in love first. Someone puts someone else up on a pedestal. Someone works very hard to keep things rolling smoothly; someone else sails along for the ride."
*
"Do you know what it's like," she said, " to know that the only way you can be happy is if you make everyone else's life miserable?"
*
Innocence looked lovely on her.
*
When I asked him if there was anything he hadn't had a chance to tell Maggie, he nodded. "That she was wrong," he said. "When we talked about it, she said it would be better to remember her as the woman she was than the woman she had become. But the truth is, now I have neither."
*
"I don't know about Jamie, but I understand doing something you know you shouldn't be doing, and knowing at the same time it's not wrong."
*
... he didn't much see how the punishment would differ: a life sentence that made the limits of your world a prison, or the prison your world became when your sentence was simply to live.
*
She wasn't thinking, What did I do to deserve this? She was wondering instead, What did you do to deserve me?
*
Allie remembered once hearing a song that said the first person you fell in love with stole your heart. The first person you made love with stole your soul. And if these were one and the same, you were damned.
*
"You can't judge the deed unless you consider the context in which it was acted out. You can't consider reason and consequence unless you also figure in emotions and morality. Nobody lives, or acts, in a vacuum."
*
"How did you do it?" he asked, his voice thick. "How did you make yourself let her go?"
Jamie wouldn't meet his eye. "I just sort of accepted the fact that it would kill me a little bit every day for the rest of my life."
*
He realized he thought of jail and dying the same way: you were just gone. It didn't really matter exactly where you went.
*
"It's very strange to talk about love at a trial like this. More often, you hear about hate. Hate drove him to take out a rifle and gun down all the people on the Long Island Railroad. Hate drove him to set a bomb in a London pub. It's clearly believable to us that hate can spur a person to action. Why not love?"