“She had learned, in the slums of her childhood, that honest people were never touchy about the matter of being trusted.”

“Aunt Helen Beck had many intentions about her death. She was about being dead the way some people are about being British - she wasn't, and it seemed she would never be, but it was clearly something she aspired to, since all the people she respected were.”

“she considered the possibility of telling her about everything that was happening, but then she changed her mind; people never learn anything by being told; they have to find out for themselves.”

“Listening to Leonard, Madeleine felt impoverished by her happy childhood. She never wondered why she acted the way she did, or what effect her parents had had on her personality. Being fortunate had dulled her powers of observation.”

“She had been trying to be honest with him, thinking her honesty would be winsome and that he would come to rescue her family, forgetting what she later learned as a writer: that to be honest is to open yourself up to people thinking you're crazy.”

“People who get nostalgic about childhood were obviously never children.”