“Nice people sometimes do terrible things because they don't want to do one small mean thing. It doesn't automatically make them a bad person forever.”

“Don't worry about what you did yesterday, he said, often, worry about what you haven't done today.”

“All i care about is giving you the happy ever after you want. In our own messy, complicated way.”

“The bookshop felt damp and chilly, but it was still and unsupervised bookshop, and Anna felt a frisson of excitement as she scanned the shelves with greedy eyes. Libraries weren't quite the same, she'd found; something about the prosaic smell of other people's houses and fingers seeping off the pages diluted that sense of magical worlds, but untouched, unread, unexplored books were something else.”

“She could remember feeling that disorienting first rush of love, as bright and light as if no one else had ever felt it, as if you were looking down into the ultimate pool of emotional revelation. She also remembered how stupid it made you.”

“A town without a bookshop is a town without a soul.”

“Why is it that we feel bad when “all” we can do for a person is pray for them? We feel like we need to work to help, but remember: prayer is the work.”