Skin Hunger: A Resurrection of Magic Isolation Quotes

Sadima has a lonely childhood. We're not sure if her dad was as overprotective and paranoid before her mom died, but whatever the reason, he doesn't allow her to have friends. At all. Luckily Sadima and her brother are pretty close, so it's not like she's completely isolated from human contact.

Not only does Sadima grow up feeling pretty isolated due to not having any friends, she also has to come to terms with the fact that she's different from other people because of her affinity with animals. No one else is like her, and no one believes her when she tries to explain it. Poor kid.

It's not just humans that crave companionship, but goats, too. Sadima realizes that she should've left this particular goat, Rebecca, at home, because she's simply that pregnant. And now that they've been out grazing, she doesn't know what to do, because Rebecca's too weak to go with the rest of the herd back home. It makes sense for goats to be afraid of being alone: they've got natural predators. For humans, though, fear of isolation is a bit more complex, isn't it?

The way Franklin talks about social ills as being caused by lack of understanding and connection between people makes a lot of sense. Since we humans can never really see inside each other's heads or hearts, we're all isolated from one another. And it's a heck of a lot easier to kill or maim someone whom you perceive to be different or apart from you than someone with whom you feel a kinship or likeness.

When Sadima is about to leave her home, it's because she realizes that she wants to be understood. Keeping her abilities a secret is hard to live with, and she hopes that by going to find Franklin in Limòri, it'll end the feeling of isolation that she's experienced ever since she realized she was different.

Sadima latches onto Franklin like a drowning kid onto a lifeguard. He represents the possibility of true understanding, which she's never experienced in her life. He knows what it's like to be different from everyone else due to some rare innate ability, and so he knows what she's gone through. No wonder she starts to fall in puppy-love with him.

And here's the downside to Sadima latching onto Franklin in her loneliness. Like her, he has some magical abilities, specifically the ability to read thoughts (even if he's mostly getting hazy images and impressions at this point). He feels her loneliness and remarks on it, but she actually feels like her privacy was violated. That's a tough one to get around.

After living in Limòri for a while, Sadima decides that she can deal with the isolation that comes with being different. Just knowing that there are others like her is enough to make her not feel like a freak.

Hahp feels bad for Will, one of the boys at the academy who now has a room to himself thanks to the wizards' starvation policy. If it stinks to be lonely even under good circumstances, how bad must it be under crummy circumstances? It's like, okay, we're going to starve you and deprive you of sleep and sunlight… now you're also stuck in solitary confinement. Ugh.

When Hahp and Gerrard clasp hands at the end of the book, Hahp realizes that part of what the wizards' training has accomplished is isolating the boys from one another. Not physically touching each other is one more aspect of how they've been encouraged to view each other as competition instead of as potential allies. Recognizing this fact will hopefully help Hahp stay in touch with his humanity.