“You know how it is: as soon as you decide to forget something, your brain comes to the conclusion that it's the most fascinating thing in the world.”

“You are a name, not a number. Never forget that name, whatever they tell you here. You will always be Chaya—life—to me.”

“The thing about endings is, they can begin quietly enough. That's how they sneak up on you.”

“Shit is another useful word. Also very common. For example, pleasantly surprised? You say 'No shit?' You think someone tells you tales, you scoff 'You're shitting me.' You find something you like very much, you exclaim 'That's good shit!”

“It is the last thing we learn, / listening to the creature world…”

“Just write. If you have to make a choice, if you say, 'Oh well, I'm going to put the writing away until my children are grown,' then you don't really want to be a writer. If you want to be a writer, you do your writing... If you don't do it, you probably don't want to be a writer, you just want to have written and be famous—which is very different.”

“The thing I want to know is, if you tell your brain not to do stuff... and it keeps doing it anyway, does that mean your mind has a mind of its own? And if it does, then who's in charge here, anyway?”