“Clear now that she was as dependent as any addict on the drug of the war. He had underestimated the damage in her.”

“A woman sees war differently.”

“She had always assumed that her life would end inside the war, that the war itself would be her eternal present, as it was for Darrow and for her brother. The possibility of time going on, her memo...”

“Saigon in utter darkness this last night of the war. A gestating monster. Her letter to Linh had been simple: I love you more than life, but I had to see the end.”

“She did not think it was true that women fell in love all at once, but rather, that they fell in love through repitition, just the way someone became brave.”

“Why did someone fall in love with you because you were one thing, and then want you to be something else?”

“War is what happens when language fails.”

“Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime.”

“The world is full enough of hurts and mischances without wars to multiply them.”