“When he thought of all he’d seen, done and experienced in his life, all he’d gained, lost, desired and agonized over, he found it inconceivable that everyone else could be subject, more or less, to the same unavoidable conditions and alternatives.”

“It finally happened, he thought as he burrowed under his shirt and took hold of his heavy cross. All his life he’d wondered why he’d never fallen in love, and now he knew: He’d been waiting for this moment, this woman, this time. The female is mine, he thought. - Manny”

“Erlendur didn’t believe in premonitions, visions or dreams, nor reincarnation or karma, he didn’t believe in God although he’d often read the Bible, nor in eternal life or that his conduct in this world would affect whether he went to heaven or hell. He felt that life itself offered a mixture of the two.Then sometimes he experienced this incomprehensible and supernatural de´ja` -vu, experienced time and place as if he’d seen it all before, as if he stepped outside himself, became an onlooker to his own life. There was no way he could explain what it was thathappened or why his mind played tricks on him like this.”

“There really was nothing firm, nothing certain. Even here, even at this place where he thought he’d found something permanent—everything could change in a day. Everything could be lost so quickly.”

“Oh that moment when Daniel thought he’d lost her to Cam’s starshot! His wings hat felt too heavy to lift. Colder than death. In that instant , he’d given up all hope.”

“There was a time he’d heard tales of Dab Sweet and he’d stuck thumbs in his belt and chin to the sky and tricked himself that was how his life had been. But the years scraped by hard as ever and he got less and the stories more ’til they were tales of a man he’d never met succeeding at what he’d never have dreamed of attempting.”