Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview: #1 The stories that live inside of us, and the memories that sustain us, can also haunt us. My mother, who was eighteen years old when she started working in Center City in Philadelphia, at Rohm and Haas, a chemical manufacturer, had bought all new clothes for the job. But her mother took a scissors and sliced through all of them in her closet. #2 My mother grew up in a brick row house in South Philadelphia on Reese Street. Her mother, Marion, was a hatcheck girl at a nightclub called Big Bill's. She had dates with all those men while her husband was away in the navy. #3 I was always fascinated with my mother's relationship with her mother. I wanted to know why they had to go visit her grandmother, and why my mother still sent her presents. #4 I was curious about my great-grandmother Rose. In my mom's stories, she was always kind and loving, but her daughter, my grandmother, was vicious and mean. I thought we were simply extensions of our parents.