"They were like heavy cigarette smokers suddenly denied their drug. They raged at the slightest rejection. "

"But he withheld his love--his vast, blind, uncritical love--from them, and they were like children withdrawn from the breast When their love was not reciprocated they punished him with a fury that puzzled them and left them guilty an shaken, offering apologies that could not be accepted, the rejection of which, in turn, produced greater hurts, ripped scar tissue before it was healed, and ended in scenes of such emotion and frenzy that the neighbours turned off their lights and came out into their gardens, where they stood silently beside fragrant trees."

Bliss, Peter Carey