“There are a lot of things I want," I say quietly and deliberately. "But I think I will keep what I have.”

“I never thought that freedom would feel so much like grief.”

“Ghosts are laid to rest when injustices are righted, when their duties are fulfilled. But my mother's duty is to make me happy so long as I live. So there is not rest for her, and no escape for me....”

“He's kissing me and though this is the first time, it feels like recovering a long-forgotten memory. My body seems to say, "Yes, this," and then I'm kissing him back as if I were born to be in his ...”

“She looked at him like it physically hurt her not to speak, and yet she stayed silent.”

“I think this point is so important, I'm going to repeat it: You should never listen to criticism that is primarily intended to wound, even if it contains more than a grain of truth.”

“There might have been prettier women in the room but, when she turned those babies on, fluttered her eyelashes, I was hers. It had taken me nearly fifteen years to extinguish their light. Now, when...”

“One ought to hold on to one's heart; for if one lets it go, one soon loses control of the head too.”

“Everybody has a home team: Its the people you call when you get a flat tire or when something terrible happens. Its the people who, near or far, know everything thats wrong with you and love you an...”

“The more you condemn yourself for thinking or feeling a certain way, the more you feel stuck within your own body and mind.. What if you went the other way and embraced it so totally that it was as...”