“Ambition robs you of your childhood. The moment you want to become an adult—in any way—something in your childhood dies.”

“In increments both measurable and not, our childhood is stolen from us -- not always in one momentous event but often in a series of small robberies, which add up to the same loss.”

“In this dirty-minded world you are either somebody's wife or somebody's whore, or fast on your way to becoming one or the other.”

“Most places we leave in childhood grow less, not more, fancy.”

“It happens to many teenagers-that moment when you feel full of resentment or distrust for those adults you once loved unquestioningly.”

“You know, everybody dies. My parents died. Your father died. Everybody dies. I'm going to die too. So will you. The thing is, to have a life before we die. It can be a real adventure having a life”

“And when you love a book, commit one glorious sentence of it-perhaps your favorite sentence-to memory. That way you won't forget the language of the story that moved you to tears.”