“Not all vegetables are this draining. Lettuce doesn't bring heartache. Turnips don't ask for your soul. Potatoes don't care where you are or even where they are. Tomatoes cuddle up to anyone who'll give them mulch and sunshine. But giants like Max need you every second. You can forget about a whiz-bang social life.”

“Will we have bodyguards?""We're not quite set up for that. But with all these mothers, you don't need them.”

“I'll tell you something about tough things. They just about kill you, but if you decide to keep working at them, you'll find the way through. On the Food Network they have these shows where cooks have to put a meal together with all these weird ingredients. That's a lot like my life-dealing with things you wouldn't think ever go together. But a good cook can make the best meal out of the craziest combinations.”

“You don't know which way a thing will come at you, but you need to welcome it with your whole heart which ever way it arrives.”

“I hope you'll have the kind of life where what you stand for is so important that it makes some people outright hostile. You won't know how strong your beliefs really are until you have to defend them.”

“You cannot measure the loss of a human life. It's all the things a person was, all their dreams, all the people who loved them, all they hoped to be and could give back to the world.”

“She stamped the book and gave it to me. "You bring it back in three weeks."I held it over my heart. Mrs. Worth smiled. "That's where a book should be carried.”