Though the trial had affirmed most of what people who'd followed the case already knew, it provided no additional clarity into why all of this had to happen. It seemed like there were just as many questions afterward, and the lessons the court proceedings provided were difficult to parse: how easily beautiful things can fool us; how real monsters are nothing like in the movies; how we think we'll be able to sense evil when we see it, but, really, we won't. To brand Lori as some fringe oddity pays no heed to all the ways he was enabled by a culture of people around her. Her crimes lacked any humanity; it was deeply uncomfortable to see Lori not as a monster, or as an animal, but as a human being.

— When the Moon Turns to Blood by Leah Sottile (Page 94)