“Since that night I have come to understand that sometimes the best families of all are those we create ourselves, the people we choose to be with.”

“Sometimes just being still is the best thing you can do for yourself.”

“In New York, the buildings are like mountains in some ways, but they are only alive because of the people living in them. Real mountains are alive all over.”

“I always tell my writing students that every good piece of writing begins with both a mystery and a love story. And that every single sentence must be a poem. And that economy is the key to all good writing. And that every character has to have a secret.”

“Now I had seen the grief of the two strongest people I knew. And somehow, Daddy's and Edie's crying made them seem even stronger to me. It was better to cry than to suck it up and go around conjuring hate in your heart”

“Maybe all the secrets of life were written on the surface of leaves, waiting to be translated. If I touched them long enough, I might be given some information no one else had.”

“I've never understood why people run to get out of the rain in the summertime... People will drive miles and miles to go jump in a cool swimming hole, but when it rains, they scatter.”