“Over the drop, a luminous pond lay below them like a pale magic lantern. It was as if the moon had plummeted into the water and smashed open. Engulfed in darkness, with only a scatter of stars abov...”

“Maria didnt fear the sea but, as taught by her father, she respected its power. In her experience the ocean had no intent to drown travellers.”

“A flock of small birds took off from the wall of the fort. They moved like a length of dark silk caught by the breeze as they headed out to sea. Behind them, the sky was the colour of forget-me-not...”

“He noticed that he felt calmer now she was here, still in that grey dress with her dowdy hat, the air around her redolent with orchid oil. Perhaps all women in England had this effect. Perhaps they...”

“There was something indomitable about Maria like Britannia. Hed heard that she kept her head during a Chilean earthquake the year before when men of greater age and experience had panicked. Afterw...”

“I pride myself on making my own decisions, sir," she said. "I do not welcome gentlemen making them for me.”

“Some experiences are universal. A girl is a girl whether she lives in West Omaha or Sweet Valley. Books are often far more than books.”

“A half-read book is a half-finished love affair.”

“The love of learning, the sequestered nooks,And all the sweet serenity of books”

“Sometimes two people have to fall apart, to realize how much they need to fall back together.”

“Good literature is one key to peace. When we stop reading each other, when we stop paying attention to each other's words and stories, we too easily oppose one another.”

“There is only one motive for writing a novel: to be published and read. To me there is no distinction between the mystery novel and the novel, only between good books and bad books. A good book tak...”

“And marbled clouds go scudding byThe many-steepled London sky.”

“I wander through each chartered street,Near where the chartered Thames does flow;A mark in every face I meet,Marks of weakness, marks of woe.In every cry of every man,In every infants cry of fear,I...”

“On Waterloo Bridge where we said our goodbyes,the weather conditions bring tears to my eyes.I wipe them away with a black woolly gloveAnd try not to notice I've fallen in loveOn Waterloo Bridge I a...”