An Introduction to the Castle: First paragraph read

We Have Always Lived in the Castle

by Shirley Jackson

~ Goodreads ~

Progress:  1 of 214 pages

My name is Mary Katherine Blackwood.  I am eighteen years old, and I live with my sister Constance.  I have often thought that with any luck at all I could have been born a werewolf, because the two middle fingers on both my hands are the same length, but I have had to be content with what I had.  I dislike washing myself, and dogs, and noise.  I like my sister Constance, and Richard Plantagenet, and Amanita phalloides, the death-cup mushroom. Everyone else in my family is dead.

For some reason this very first paragraph just stood out to me.

And also, I went and did a Google search for Amanita phalloides because I was curious... then realized that she DOES tell us what that is in the paragraph.  Observant, I am not...