“In fact, he sorely hoped that it would happen, because otherwise, the world made no sense, there was no justice, and life was just a tangled ball of chaos.”

“If they'd been dogs, they would have all been in the yard eating grass and trying to yak up whatever was making them feel so lousy. Not a bone gnawed, not a ball chased-all tails went unwagged. Oh, life is a fast cat, a short leash, a flea in that place where you just can't scratch.”

“The problem with being nuts, she thought, is that you don't always feel as if you're nuts. Sometimes, in fact, you feel perfectly sane, and there just happens to be a trailer-shaped dragon crouching in the lot next door.”

“Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry, you can't have a baby brother, because that would mean that Daddy had sex, and that's never going to happen again.”

“Joshua, my memory of Maggie isn't about what happened the night before we left. I didn't go to see her thinking that we would make love. A kiss was more than I expected. I think of Maggie because I made a place in my heart for her to live, and it's empty. It always will be. It always was. She loved you.”

“Just because he was pretty didn't mean he couldn't be improved by a smack upside the head with a piece of earnest hickory”

“Hope is bulletproof, truth just hard to hit”