“Things have a way of falling into place.”

“She was tough in the best sense of the word. She'd taken blows, the disappointments, and had worked her way through them. Some people, he knew, would have buckled under, found a clutch, or given up. But she had carved a place for herself and made it work.”

“I've found out that falling in love doesn't have anything to do with time. It can take a year or an instant. It happens when it's ready to happen.”

“Even a good place gets to be a rut, especially if you're standing in it alone... Alone and lonely have the same root.”

“You don't fix a man the way you do a fault in a pipe or a leak in a roof. You take him as he is, Mary Brenna, or you don't take him at all...adjustments can't be all made on one side, darling, else the balance goes off and what's being built just falls down.”

“comparison are designed to make someone fall short”

“Simon's initial annoyance with having so many people and animals swarming around gave way to the realization that sometimes people didn't get in the way, but helped make a necessary and tedious job go smoother.”