“Later, in my adulthood, I will read the book again, even watch the movie, and understand that I wasn’t equipped, as a child, to make room for arguments that would undermine every single choice made for me, that would shatter the foundations of my very existence. I would see that I had to believe everything I was taught, if only to survive. For a long time I wouldn’t be ready to accept that my worldview could be wrong, but I do not look back with shame at my ignorance.”

“Books were my hobby, even as a child,' he told me. 'I read about every book in Milkwaukee Public Library before I was 15...Some of the books I didn't understand- but I read them just the same. I believed, you see, that my life work would be teaching, so I wanted to learning everything I could about every possible subject.”

“I realized that I had to rebuild my foundation. I had a choice about how to see my life: I could look only at the negative or I could emphasise the positive. It took all the energy I could muster to accept that my miscarriage had happened for a reason.”

“If I write a book I do it mostly for myself for the child in me and for the adult in me. The criterion for my children’s books is: If I were a child would I like it That’s very egotistical but it’s the same thing with my books for adults. I wouldn’t do a book if I didn’t want to partake and share. With a book I can do both: I give and I share.”

“I was in the book, and the book was in my head, and as long as I stayed inside my head, I could go on writing the book. It was like living in a padded cell, but of all the lives I could have lived at that moment, it was the only one that made sense to me. I wasn't capable of being in the world, and I knew that if I tried to go back into it before I was ready, I would be crushed.”

“I would have to commit to this- commit as much of me as there was left, every one of the broken pieces. It was the only way to be fair to him. Would I? Could I?Would it be wrong to try to make Jacob happy? Even if the love I felt for him was no more than a weak echo of what I was capable of, even if my heart was far away, wandering and grieving after my fickle Romeo, would it be so very wrong?”