“Crowds of questions stream through me like lines of people exiting a soccer ground or a concert. They push and shove and trip. Some make their way around. Some remain in their seats, waiting for their opportunity.”

“The way two people can end up in the same place, find each other in a crowd, and change their lives and the lives of the people around them forever... It makes you believe in fate. And fate gives love some authority. Like it's been stamped with approval from above, if you believe in above. A godly green light. Some destined significance.”

“They lived in a great city, a metropolis of many narratives that converged briefly and then separated for ever, discovering their different dooms in that crowd of stories through which all of us, following our own destinies, had to push and shove to find our way through, or out. ”

“Her teeth were like a soccer crowd, crammed in.”

“Some people make tunes, but it is lines that run like moving messages through my head. Whatever else I am saying and doing often has no bearing on this inner, verbal life.”

“I’m the girl who trips on the dance floor and can’t find her way to the exit. All eyes on me.”