“Afterward he remembered only the feeling that he was about to leave somewhere small and rational - a place that made sense - for somewhere huge and old that didn't.”

“Whatever a guidebook says, wether or not you leave somewhere with a sense of the place is entirely a matter of smell and instinct.”

“That’s the funny thing about arriving somewhere, Vin,” he said with a wink. “Once you’re there, the only thing you can really do is leave again.”

“And he didn't really know where he was going, but he did know he was going somewhere, because you really have to go somewhere, don't you?”

“For the perfect gentleman was out there somewhere, waiting for her. He would be nothing like Father, he would be an artist, with an artist's sense of beauty and possibility, who didn't care two whits about bricks and bugs. Who was open and easy to read, whose passions and dreams brought light to his eyes. And he would love her, and only her.”

“Writing, real writing, should leave a small sweet bruise somewhere on the writer . . . and on the reader.”