“I think this is the way love feels to people like you and me. Threatening and dangerous. We have to be in control, and love takes that away. People like us… We can't tolerate vulnerability. But despite our best efforts, sooner or later love seems to catch up with us. And then…And then we fall apart.”

“Anyone who tells you that the Yao people never care for their daughters is lying. We may be worthless. We may be raised for another family. But often we are loved and cherished, despite our natal families' best efforts not to have feelings for us.”

“We consciously decide whether to consider people; we fall in love despite ourselves; we entirely fail to fall in love with people who fall in love with us. It is a mightily complicated business.”

“Poets often describe love as an emotion that we can't control, one that overwhelms logic and common sense. That's what it was like for me. I didn't plan on falling in love with you, and I doubt if oyu planned on fallin gin love with me. But once we met, it was clear that neither of us could control what was happening to us. We fell in love, despite our differences, and once we did, something rare and beautiful was created. For me, love like that has happened only once, and that's why every minute we spent together has been seared in my memory. I'll never forget a single moment of it.”

“Even if we had gone away together when I wanted us to, we would've been together for a year, maybe two. But sooner or later, other people would've found a way to wedge us apart.”

“Love is the most dangerous craving of all, if you ask me. It turns us into people we aren't. It makes us feel like hell, and makes us walk on water. It ruins us for anything else.”