“ Valerie Sherwood, I said to myself, you're going to die. ”

“If Mr. Castillo had been in charge of building the Ark, Noah would have wound up with a boat the size of the New Jersey.""It still wouldn't have been big enough for all those animals," said Freddie. "Honestly, Freddie," I said. "Don't you know a joke when you hear one?""Sure," he said. "Just the same, Val, with the few people the Ark had aboard, there wouldn't be enough of them to shovel all the-"I threw a pine cone at him and chased him back to camp.”

“Are you sure that's Val?""No," said Freddie. "It's Lassie in a wolf suit.”

“Action will sometimes be required, but if you're really doingit in line with what the Universe is trying to bring to you, it'sgoing to feel joyous. You're going to feel so alive. Time willjust stop. You could do it all day.”

“I’m going to hell, Livia,” he said.“I’m going to hell for all three of us,” Beckett said defiantly. Only now did he pull his hand away.“I think you might be a better man than you give yourself credit for,” Livia said, trying to catch his eye again.”

“So I'm sitting in that damn chair, ready to die, and I say to her, 'You're the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. I'm so damn glad you're going to kill me instead of some brainless, toothless druggie." Beckett smiled again at the memory of his almost-murder. "Then she traded the knife for her lips, and now she works for me." Beckett put his hands behind his head and flexed his giant biceps. "She won't tell me who hired her to come here. She's the deadliest person I've ever encountered. I still think she might kill me, but I can't stop looking at her.”

“Four generations of women--"I'm a woman," Mary said to herself--heading off on a journey in a car. One of the dead, one of them dying, one of the driving, one of them just staring out.”