“The girls screamed. They covered themselves with their hands and turned their backs and so on, and made themselves utterly beautiful.”

“This couple, so involved with babies, had never reproduced themselves, though they could have. This was an interesting comment on the whole idea of reproduction.”

“So, in the interests of survival, they trained themselves to be agreeing machines instead of thinking machines. All their minds had to do was to discover what other people were thinking, and then they thought that, too.”

“But she did look back, and I love her for that, because it was so human. So she was turned to a pillar of salt. So it goes. People aren't supposed to look back. I'm certainly not going to do it anymore.”

“What made marriage so difficult back then was yet again that instigator of so many other sorts of heartbreak: the oversize brain.”

“Avoiding Germans, they were delivering themselves into rural silences ever more profound. They ate snow.”

“And Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she did look back, and I love her for that, because it was so human. So she was turned into a pillar of salt. So it goes.”