“Each memory is like a paper flower stowed up a magician's sleeve: invisible one moment and then so substantial and florid the next I cannot imagine how it stayed hidden all this time. And like those paper flowers, once they've been let loose in the world, the memories are impossible to tuck away again.”

“The small wad of burning paper drew down to a wisp of flame and then died out leaving a faint pattern for just a moment in the incandescence like the shape of a flower, a molten rose. Then all was dark again.”

“This is how memories are; what seems so clear and unforgettable at one moment vanishes like steam the next.”

“All those moments, those memories. Everything that we are, compressed in just two or three kilos of paper — the weight of a human heart.”

“The memory of my father is wrapped up in white paper, like sandwiches taken for a day of work. Just as a magician takes towers and rabbits out of his hat, he drew love from his small body.”

“This was a voice that drew out memories stretched thin by years of recollection, like paper unfolded and refolded too many times. A voice that brought back, like a wave, the memory of another time on this bridge, a night so long ago, everything black and silver and the river rushing away under her feet...”