“Some of the dead are too useful for sympathyThe past we own exists on stone and white paper.”

“You, little blank slate,on which we write our misfortune,learn the lesson for today:you are rare enough to be stolen.”

“What is the savior of the world doing among these wire fences, in all this broken glass?”

“Jake looked at us like we should know this already. "SMB? Sandwich-Making Bitch.”

“We haven't met yet, I'm Brandon Taylor." Dear Lord that voice could warm me on the coldest day of the year.”

“People dread silence because it is transparent; like clear water, which reveals every obstacle—the used, the dead, the drowned, silence reveals the cast-off words and thoughts dropped in to obscure its clear stream. And when people stare too close to silence they sometimes face their own reflections, their magnified shadows in the depths, and that frightens them. I know; I know.”

“We are all tellers of tales, and we seek to provide our scattered and often confusing experiences with a sense of coherence by arranging the episodes of our lives. Starting in late adolescence, we manufacture our dramatic personal myths by selectively mining some experiences and neglecting or forgetting others.”