“I've always said that idleness dulls the spirit. We have to keep the brain busy, or at least the hands if we don't have a brain.”

“The bookseller handed me the book and winked."Have a good look at it, little dumpling. I don't want you coming back to me saying I've switched it, eh?""I trust you," I said."Stuff and nonsense. The last guy who said that to me (a tourist who was convinced that Hemingway had invented the fabada stew during the San Fermín bull run) bought a copy of Hamlet signed by Shakespeare in ballpoint, imagine that. So keep your eyes peeled. In the book business, you can't even trust the index.”

“I discovered that seventeen-year-old girls have such huge verbal energy that their brain drives them to expend it every twenty seconds. On the third day I decided I had to find her a boyfriend -- if possible, a deaf one.”

“I believe that nothing happens by chance. Deep down, things have their own secret plan, even though we don't understand it .”

“He would have liked to know that somebody wanted to keep him alive, that someone remembered him. He used to say that we exist as long as somebody remembers us.”

“Don't say another word. If you think you're the only person for whom life is painful, you're wrong. And if you don't mind letting yourself die like a dog, at least have the decency to remember that there are those of us who do care- although, to tell the truth, I don't see why.”

“In the shop we buy & sell them, but in truth books have no owner.”