But fairytales were, at best, dirty mirrors whose warped and pitted surfaces reflected a highly distorted view of the truth, quite different from reality.

She had come into the garden expecting summer roses and had instead been caught in a bank of twisted, thorny, frostbitten vines.

Psychological imprisonment was no less uncomfortable than its physical counterpart. In some ways, it was even worse; it provided the illusion of physical freedom, but garnered none of the benefits of it.

We spend much of our lives going about completely blind to reality, and yet we still have the gall to act victimized when it invariably catches up to us.