They were Republicans, Nixon Republicans, and so didn't subscribe to the notion that laws are supposed to apply to all people equally.

I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to.

They talk about big skies in the western United States, and they may indeed have them, but you have never seen such lofty clouds, such towering anvils, as in Iowa in July.

Imagine having a city full of things that no other city had.

It takes strength to become weak!

The writer's business is to find the shape in unruly life and to serve her story.

If I really seem vain, it is that I am only vain in my ways—not in my heart. The worst women are those vain in their hearts, and not in their ways.

My eyebrows could do with a trim.

You’re seventeen,” Magnus said. “You can’t have wasted a life you’ve barely lived.

I don't profess to be profound; but I do lay claim to common sense.

It is the fundamental theory of all the more recent American law...that the average citizen is half-witted, and hence not to be trusted to either his own devices or his own thoughts.

Why are women so fond of raking up the past? They're as bad as tailors, who invariably remember what you owe them for a suit long after you've ceased to wear it.

Boston is an oasis in the desert, a place where the larger proportion of people are loving, rational and happy.

The obstacle in the path becomes the path. Never forget, within every obstacle is an opportunity to improve our condition.