“It was hopeless, life, really. It was set up all wrong.”

“I'd never really had arguments like this before, arguments I couldn't understand properly, arguments where both sides were right and wrong all at the same time.”

“If you really wanted to mess me up, you should have got to me earlier.”

“We all spend so much time not saying what we want, because we know we can't have it. And because it sounds ungracious, or ungrateful, or disloyal, or childish, or banal. Or because we're so desperate to pretend that things are OK, really, that confessing to ourselves they're not looks like a bad move. Go on, say what you want. ... Whatever it is, say it to yourself. The truth will set you free. Either that or it'll get you a punch in the nose. Surviving in whatever life you're living means lying, and lying corrodes the soul, so take a break from the lies for just one minute.”

“And another way of explaining it is to say that shit happens, and there's no space too small, too dark and airless and fucking hopeless, for people to crawl into.”

“I have tried to live with women who share a similar sensibility to mine, with predictably disastrous consequences, but the opposite route seems every bit as hopeless.”

“If the price you have to pay for a sin is so high that you end up wanting to kill yourself and committing suicide is an even worse sin, then Someone's done his sums wrong. Someone's overcharging.”