“Having books standing on a shelf in a room is like having completely different worlds at the ready, waiting to be explored.”

“Eric: But you already know...Greta: Well, yeah, but I still want us to have The Talk. All daughters get to have The Talk.Eric: Fine. You remember the book "If you give a Mouse a Cookie"?Greta: Ye-es.Eric: It's like that.Greta: No it isn't.Eric: No. It absolutely is...Eric: If you give a boy a kiss, he'll want to touch your cookies. If you let him touch your cookies, he'll want to unwrap them. If you let him unwrap them, he'll want to put them in his mouth. And THEN, if you let him put them in his mouth, the boy will want to pet your kitty. But if you let him pet your kitty, he'll want to see your kitty. And of course, if you let him see your kitty, then he'll want to feed it. And if you let him kiss you, touch your cookies, unwrap your cookies, put them in his mouth, pet your kitty, see your kitty, and feed your kitty, you'll get pregnant unless you make him wear a raincoat on his banana. So it's better if you just kick the boy in the nuts and run over him with the car.Greta: I don't think that's how The Talk usually goes.Eric: No?Greta: No, but it's okay, Dad. I like your version, too.”

“I have a sixth sense for things I don't want to know and her manner pegged this as top of the scale ignorance-is-bliss material.”

“For the writer, the risks are quite palpable and enduring. With each new character, each new setting, and each new plotline, something dark from deep inside the recesses of our minds makes its way to the surface where it will take hold and remain. I wouldn't have it any other way.”

“The question is not, who uses faith and who uses reason? Everyone uses both. The question instead should be, who has the most reasonable faith?”

“If your head comes off, don't start a fight in a goddamn bowling alley.”

“Among the many worlds which man did not receive as a gift of nature, but which he created with his own mind, the world of books is the greatest. Every child, scrawling his first letters on his slate and attempting to read for the first time, in so doing, enters an artificial and complicated world; to know the laws and rules of this world completely and to practice them perfectly, no single human life is long enough. Without words, without writing, and without books there would be no history, there could be no concept of humanity. And if anyone wants to try to enclose in a small space in a single house or single room, the history of the human spirit and to make it his own, he can only do this in the form of a collection of books.”