“This was what Parker had learned early on about disappointment; its sting lasts only in the beginning, only until the body goes numb from its repetition.”

“..numbed by disappointment and betrayal, like a child who had been awakened suddenly from a summer dream about christmas morning.”

“I'll tell you a secret about storytelling. Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty... were not perfect in the beginning. It's only a happy ending on the last page, right? If the princess had everything from the beginning, there wouldn't be a story. Anyone who is imperfect or incomplete can become the main character in the story.”

“It's only when the tide goes out that you learn who's been swimming naked.”

“There is no tragedy, only the unavoidable. Everything has its reason for being: you only need to distinguish what is temporary from what is lasting.”

“The actual life of a thought lasts only until it reaches the point of speech...As soon as our thinking has found words it ceases to be sincere...When it begins to exist in others it ceases to live in us, just as the child severs itself from its mother when it enters into its own existence.”