It was only a couple of chickens. Real chickens. The kind that walk around clucking and pecking. Which is what they were doing. Only no one else seemed to care, or even notice. This is...

I’d never opened up the gas station if it had been someone else, but I know Tucker’s fond of you. It’s a shame you don’t keep in touch with the old man.

Losing your parent at a tender age is like losing everything thing. The love, care, support and what have you. It only takes determination, strong will and the love, care and support from others to...

We came here because no place would take us after our momma died. They all said go away, come back when you’re older, when you know better, when you’ve learned. Only no one wants to...

Have my moments, Doll, have my moments.

We formed an impromptu circle just so we could look at each other and memorize faces. We hardly noticed the waiting officials. We hardly noticed anything but our little family whose ties weren’t loosening at...

Her mother admonished through closed lips, the sound a mother can make mean anything from “pick up your socks” to “we are very disappointed you have murdered those orphans.

You found us, and then lied to us so you could get a job?

I reached down and picked up a baseball bat at my feet and I flung it as hard as it could. It circled and arced high in the air until it slammed against the side...

The inspector had interviewed boys before, boys from the poorest parts of town. He had the habit of not specifying “mam” or “dad” or even “parents.” They were things he knew not every child possessed...

She was learning that being with Slade was like riding a roller coaster. Good news one minute and bad news the next. She could only imagine what this restaurant must be like.

If every Christian family in the United States would simply commit to pray and ask God if HE wants to use them to bless a child without a family, well, we’d change the world. If...

I don’t really know them, but I know this: they’re just like your kids were. Or are. Sweet, trusting, good in ways we adults hardly even remember. We have to look out for them. Not...

Mrs. Scatcherd raps Dutchy’s knuckles several times with a long wooden ruler, though it seems to me a halfhearted penalty. He barely winces, then shakes his hands twice in the air and winks at me....

Let me introduce you. Sophie, this is Miss Eliot, from the National Childcare Agency. Miss Eliot, this is Sophie, from the ocean.

Perhaps there are those who are able to go about their lives unfettered by such concerns. But for those like us, our fate is to face the world as orphans, chasing through long years the...

A brick is a biographical film in which a young orphan brick from the wrong side of the track grows up to be one of the most important bricks in all brick kind, as it...

It’s all right. I’m not upset. After all, they were just things. When you’ve lost your mother and your father, you can’t care so much about things, can you?

There is a kind of virtue that lies not in extraordinary actions, not in saving poor orphans from burning buildings, but in steadfastly working for a world where orphans are not poor and buildings comply...

When other girls were dreaming about love, she dreamt of love too, but in an entirely different context – the ones they took for granted.

A little while ago, I stood by the grave of the old Napoleon—a magnificent tomb of gilt and gold, fit almost for a dead deity—and gazed upon the sarcophagus of rare and nameless marble, where...

Worship Allah and associate nothing with Him, and to parents do good, and to relatives, orphans, the needy, the near neighbor, the neighbor farther away, the companion at your side, the traveler, and those whom...

It seemed like an unachievable goal for one person to bring sunshine to one hundred little faces when what they need is a mother apiece.

The women laughed and wept; the crowd stamped their feet enthusiastically, for at that moment Quasimodo was really beautiful. He was handsome — this orphan, this foundling, this outcast.

It’s rather good to pretend to be normal with someone.

The purpose of having the orphans study all these diverse fields was not for them to just become geniuses, but to become polymaths – meaning they would be geniuses in a wide variety of fields.

I’m not sure I ever met an American teacher in Korea that hadn’t volunteered at an orphanage at least once—even our resident idiot could be surprisingly decent on occasion—but I’ve also visited foreign countries where...

Must have a lot of male customers to let her dress like that. Nice view.

There,” she said. She rocked him back and forth. “There, you foolish, beautiful boy who wants to change the world. There, there. And who could keep from loving you? Who could keep from loving a...