“Because even though you don't want anyone to own you, it doesn't mean that there is nowhere you belong.”

“If the boy did have a good and loving mother somewhere, surely they would find her.God only knew how she wanted to believe it. Every single day, she practiced her detachment skills, trying not to care about everything that was wrong with the world. Or rather...to care, but in a suitably civilized manner, with an admirable commitment that might still be set aside when she came home to Morten and her family, complete with well-reasoned and coherent opinions of the humanist persuasion. Right now she felt more like one of those manic women from the animal protection societies, with wild hair and ever wilder eyes. Desperate.”

“She felt as if she was standing at the edge of an abyss, but she was in no way counting on God to rescue her. On the contrary. I don’t believe in any of it. Not anymore.”

“Because even though the truth can set you free, that doesn't mean it won't be painful.”

“Just because people don't love you the way you want, doesn't mean they don't love you the best they can.”

“I don't belong here. It doesn't matter, because even if I don't belong in this place, she's here and I want to be where she is.”

“The fact that I am writing to you in English already falsifies what I wanted to tell you. My subject: how to explain to you that I do not belong to English though I belong nowhere else.”