“The earth's orbit didn't slow down. The world didn't stop falling. Slowly, very, very slowly, Michael started to sink to his knees.”

“Women were different, no doubt about it. Men broke so much more quickly. Grief didn't break women. Instead it wore them down, it hollowed them out very slowly.”

“I didn't understand this overwhelming attraction to a boy I just met, but one thing was sure: I was slowly, but deeply, falling for him.”

“I didn't want to see them lower him into the ground in the spot he'd picked out with his dad, and I didn't want to see his parents sink to their knees in the dew-wet grass and moan in pain....”

“Their mistake was the mistake of Galileo. He was right that the earth revolves around the sun, but he didn't know that the entire solar system revolves around yet another center; he didn't know that the real orbit of the earth, as opposed to the relative orbit, is by no means some naive circle...”

“At which time the repulsor puts out its final effort and slows you down so you crash quite slowly into the surface.""Crash.""Quite slowly."Face & Luke”