“(M)aybe we too busy being flowers or fairies or strawberries instead of something honest and worthy of respect . . . you know . . . like being people.”

“We stand there with this big smile of respect between us. It’s about as real a smile as girls can do for each other, considering we don’t practice real smiling every day, you know, cause maybe we too busy being flowers or fairies or strawberries instead of something honest and worthy of respect . . . you know . . . like being people.”

“I don't know whom or what he was defying. [...] [M]aybe the God he had never believed in.”

“I always think of books as being like people. Even the dull ones are worthy of decent respect, but you don't have to seek them out and spend time with them.”

“When you hear people in church, debasing themselves and saying that they are miserable sinners, and all the rest of it, it seems contemptible and not worthy of self-respecting human beings.”

“Too many books. . . too many fairy tales led him to believe that there was something romantic in being a soldier.”