“Levi’s motives were never quite as obvious. There was an Old Testament ruthlessness about him, Shambler thought, something inscrutably tribal at the root.”

“He was struck by the sensation she’d made it happen in some way, that his life was simply a story the old woman was making up in her head.”

“He wasn’t a religious man but a vision of what Paradise might be came to him, a windowed room afloat on an endless sea, walls packed floor to ceiling with all the books ever written or dreamed of. It was nearly enough to make giving up the world bearable.”

“From what I have seen of the world, Reverend, motherhood is a certainty, but fatherhood is a subject of debate.”

“Every hour that passes, another hundredweight of sand is poured in through a tiny hole in Landsman's soul. After his eyes are closed, what happens is never quite sleep, and the thoughts that plague him, though atrocious, are never quite dreams.”

“The truth was, the more he got portrayed as an unprincipled, ruthless prick, the more clients flocked to him. Because when it came to divorce, people wanted a ruthless prick. They lined up for one.”

“I know it sounds foolishly old fashioned, but I'm stuck with this idea that there's something dignified and noble about facing your enemy and looking him in the eye before you thrust a saber in his heart.”