“Don't spend time with anyone you don't like.”

“Lotte watched Peter's fingers gently massaging his forehead and felt a wave of affection. The slightest stress - anxiety, embarrassment, confusion - brought his hand to his brow, like a thumb to the mouth of a child.”

“[My guilty pleasure is a] deep, eco-unfriendly, hot bath. Preferably with a glass of champagne and someone sitting on the loo seat gossiping.”

“If you find yourself in a situation where you are neither learning nor contributing, it is your responsibility to use The Law of Two Feet to go elsewhere.”

“Images of African Americans as bad mothers, ineffective mothers, and matriarchs...conceal and justify the difficult conditions in which they work and raise children. But oddly enough, these same women, who are said to run amok in their own communities, are thought to be entirely competent at parenting the children of the elite-as mammies during slavery, as domestic workers during segregation, or as child care workers today.”

“I love to dance between the purple valley and white corner moon...”

“The playwright Edward Albee has characterized [the suddenness of the appearance of fruits and flowers in evolutionary history] as 'that heartbreaking second when it all got together: the sugars and the acids and the ultraviolets, and the next thing you knew there were tangerines and string quartets.”