“As the chapters took shape, a change came over her. It was the double-sided recognition that this book, the last that she would write, might achieve esteem and success equal to her great novel, but...”

“What spares us is memory, he said. Its what makes us worth saving. However low we sink, whatever promise we no longer fulfill, we tell our stories. Thats why youre so important, Charlie. Youre a gu...”

“Of course, when you fall out of love, its rarely about just one failure or one betrayal, is it? . . . How does it happen? All those things you once loved about each other are replaced by other thin...”

“Take a seat, Charlie, he said. Ill kill you in a few minutes. Itll be good for you.”

“Over the years, Skye sampled every drug she could find, and like many addicts, had a working knowledge of pharmacology. She snorted coke and swallowed pills. She took downersorange and red Seconal,...”

“At first, he talked about the flowers in the garden behind his country house in Surrey. His voice still had its Midlands accent but was soft now and barely audible. He knew the plants by name and t...”

“How often do we tell our own life story? How often do we adjust, embellish, make sly cuts? And the longer life goes on, the fewer are those around to challenge our account, to remind us that our li...”

“Because I always feel like runningNot away, because there is no such placeBecause if there was, I would have found it by nowBecause it's easier to run,Easier than staying and finding out you're the...”

“The paths carved by the divine carpenter into her palms are actually treasure maps showing the way to heaven.”

“What spares us is memory, he said. Its what makes us worth saving. However low we sink, whatever promise we no longer fulfill, we tell our stories. Thats why youre so important, Charlie. Youre a gu...”

“Take a seat, Charlie, he said. Ill kill you in a few minutes. Itll be good for you.”

“What spares us is memory,” he said. “It’s what makes us worth saving. However low we sink, whatever promise we no longer fulfill, we tell our stories. That’s why you’re so important, Charlie. You’r...”

“I shiver, thinking how easy it is to be totally wrong about people-to see one tiny part of them and confuse it for the whole, to see the cause and think it's the effect or vice versa”

“At sunrise everything is luminous but not clear.”

“I think it's impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves.”