“How can he not share his newfound joy with his fellow man? And it is joy. Theres a pure kind of joy in the certainty of belief. The certainty that your life has purpose and meaning.”

“Should I tell him that I think dreams never die even when they're dead?”

“CARL SAGAN SAID that if you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe. When he says from scratch, he means fromnothing. He means from a time before the world even e...”

“However, if the long shot is your only shot, then you have to take it.”

“I wonder if she realizes how passionate she is about not being passionate.”

“Did your parents care that he was white?""They never met him." I couldn't imagine taking him to meet my dad. Watching them talk to each other would've been tortuous. Also, I never wanted him to see...”

“I cannot express how lordly and transfigured I felt at that moment. I was a prince of that harbor, a porpoise king - slim among the buoys and the water traffic.”

“This [sand-dollar hunting] had become one of our rituals together, and though she would search for other varieties of shells when I was out of town or unable to see her, she would wait until I appe...”

“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...”

“I wish you could be kissed, Jane,' he said. 'Because I would beg just one off you. Under all this.' He flailed an arm toward the stars.”

“The blue of the sky is one of the most special colors in the world, because the color is deep but see-through both at the same time.”

“Is this thing safe?""Safe as life," Gansey replied.”

“At such times, under an abated sun; afloat all day upon smooth, slow heaving swells; seated in his boat, light as a birch canoe; and so sociably mixing with the soft waves themselves, that like hea...”

“Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down, 'Twas sad as sad could be; And we did speak only to break The silence of the sea! All in a hot and copper sky, The bloody Sun, at noon, Right up above t...”

“When Rachel Carson accepted the National Book Award, she said, 'if there is poetry in my book about the sea it is not because I deliberately put it there but because no one could write truthfully a...”