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

“Three or four times only in my youth did I glimpse the Joyous Isles, before they were lost to fogs, depressions, cold fronts, ill winds, and contrary tides... I mistook them for adulthood. Assuming...”

“Peace, though beloved of our Lord, is a cardinal virtue only if your neighbors share your conscience.”

“Glass & peace alike betray proof of fragility under repeated blows.”

“I believe there is another world waiting for us. A better world. And I'll be waiting for you there.”

“Souls cross ages like clouds cross skies, an' tho' a cloud's shape nor hue nor size don't stay the same, it's still a cloud an' so is a soul. Who can say where the cloud's blowed from or who the so...”

“And then things would be fine. Then I'd be fine.”

“Yes, our Father has a plan, Ciminae, he said. But he leaves it up to his children to accept his will. It is their agency. He cannot force his will upon them. If he did, he would cease to be God. Th...”

“We will continue to march, even if everything shatters, because today Germany hears us, and tomorrow, the whole world. And because of the Great War, the world lies in ruins, but devil may care, we ...”

“Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of wi...”

“My dear,Find what you love and let it kill you.Let it drain you of your all. Let it cling onto your back and weigh you down into eventual nothingness.Let it kill you and let it devour your remains....”

“If you gave someone your heart and they died, did they take it with them? Did you spend the rest of forever with a hole inside you that couldn't be filled?”

“A few blossoms float into the room. They drop like frayed yellow ribbons on the gray carpet.”

“Gula and Cali lie on their sides, their tiny adder-mouths showing the pink of their palates, their bodies throbbing with lustful and obscene dreams. The sky releases its burden of sun and color. Ey...”

“... there was no need for him to hasten towards the attainment of a happiness already captured and held in a safe place, which would not escape his grasp again.”