In retrospect, it seems like everything in my life led to me becoming a writer. I just didn't realise it at the time.

You make a life out of what you have, not what you're missing.

A girl expecting rescue never learns to save herself. Even with the means, she will find her courage wanting.

Memory is a cruel mistress with whom we all must learn to dance.

It's a terrible thing, isn't it, the way we throw people away?

Reluctance to begin is quick to befriend procrastination. . . .

In each man's heart there lies a hole. A dark abyss of need, the filling of which takes precedence over all else.

His words had tossed the book that was her life into the air and the pages had been blown into disarray, could never be put back together to tell the same story.

It was such a pleasure to sink one's hands into the warm earth, to feel at one's fingertips the possibilities of the new season.

There's a market for mysteries for adults. That feeling of opening a book and delving inside and not coming out until you've closed the book.

But history is a faithless teller whose cruel recourse to hindsight makes fools of its actors.

When we talk about mortality we are talking about our children.

One more drink and I'll be under the host.

In some sense, I'm a romantic. I like the idea of organic history and tradition.

Never become so involved with something that it blinds you. Never forget where you from; someone will remind you.

The secrets of slavery are concealed like those of the Inquisition.

I wanted to be a journalist for a long time.

Change doesn't need to be overwhelming; it is not impossible.

Everyday above ground is a great day, remember that.

Some people can't believe in themselves until someone else believes in them first.

By the plain form of my delirium I will blast the obstruction of every form around me into something barely called shadow. I sail. I swim to you. I know the water.