“Austin cleared his throat. Given the choice between being with books or people, he'd always choose books. You could always tell what a book thought without needing to have a confrontation. People, on the other hand, defensively clung to their need to be right no matter how flawed their thinking.”

“Pain or perspective, that's the choice.'. . . You choose pain - you choose to fight it, deny it, bury it - then yes, the choice is always hard. But you choose perspective - embrace your history, give it credit for the better person it can make you, scars and all - the choice gets easier every time.”

“How can there be love without a true choice? Would you suggest that man be stripped of the capacity to love?”

“Tears flooded her eyes and her heart beat heavily, but she knew it would be all right, because she knew that in the end the kind of power that was in these Books would never let her down.”

“These were his people--a strange thought. Maybe not his very own people, as in father, mother, brother, sister, but people just like him. He was lost but not so lost after all.”

“A woman needs what a woman needs.”

“You should know something, Miriam.... God changed our futures yesterday. There's no other explanation for what happened. And it wasn't the first God. If you ever need hlep, you might want to try the second God.”