“She would read anything from a dictionary to a treatise on turnips. Print fascinated her, dazed her, made her good for nothing...Kylie Tennant”

“Kylie thought hell would be announcing a snow day before she agreed with anything her mom said. But right now, Kylie wondered how many inches they were predicting.”

“She was afraid to touch the dictionary — Oki was even there. Innumerable words reminded her of him. To link whatever she saw and heard with her love was nothing less than to be alive. Her awareness of her body was inseparable from her memory of his embrace.”

“Gregori made certain she wanted to fight. He whispered to her in his most beguiling voice, promised a fascinating future, lured her with the secrets and beauty of the universe awaiting her. He promised she would never be left alone; he would be there to guide her, to protect her, to see to her happiness.”

“There was nothing particularly special about her, except that she was good with numbers, and very good at lying, and she made her home in between the pages of books.”

“The book she had been reading was under her pillow, pressing its cover against her ear as if to lure her back into its printed pages.”