“Sorry? Sorry? Sorry isn't enough. Every. Single. Thing. I ever loved is beyond my reach now. Everything I ever wanted. Everything I ever was.”

“I want her so much that it overrides everything else, every other thought in my head, every instinct, every restraint.”

“I can think of nothing but the stars. It is like a piece of my soul had been lost, empty, and it is now filled with the light of a million stars. They are all that I have ever dreamed of; they are nothing that I ever expected... I will never, never be the same. I have seen stars. Real stars.”

“I’m sorry.’ The two most inadequate words in the English language.”

“I can't be the kind of leader you want me to," he says. "I will never, ever be the kind of leader you want me to be. And I will be better because of it.”

“I learned that life is so, so fragile. I learned that you can know someone for just days and never forget the impression he left on you. I learned that art can be beautiful and sad at the same time. I learned that if someone loves you, he'll wait for you to love him back. I learned that how much you want something doesn't determine whether you get it or not, that "no" might not be enough, that life isn't fair, that my parents can't save me, that maybe no one can.”

“I wrote a book. It sucked. I wrote nine more books. They sucked, too. Meanwhile, I read every single thing I could find on publishing and writing, went to conferences, joined professional organizations, hooked up with fellow writers in critique groups, and didn’t give up. Then I wrote one more book.”