“It’s not lit, it’s literature. Lit is something a book can be, after you’ve decided to burn it. (I suggest you start the fire with my book.)”

“There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches.”

“And the attraction burns fire amongst us and the spark is lit. We humans just add fuel to the fire." Lucas whispered behind her.”

“The baby explodes into an unknown world that is only knowable through some kind of a story – of course that is how we all live, it’s the narrative of our lives, but adoption drops you into the story after it has started. It’s like reading a book with the first few pages missing. It’s like arriving after curtain up. The feeling that something is missing never, ever leaves you – and it can’t, and it shouldn’t, because something is missing.”

“And yet it's there, we witnessed it being lit. And fires once lit have to burn until they spend themselves or someone extinguishes them,” Anaxantis said, with some deep regret coating his voice.”

“Somebody once said if it’s something a single book can explain,it’s not worth having explained. What I mean is don’t leap toany conclusions.”