“It was a particularly good evening to begin a book.”

“Now everything was changed. She walked about with cautious, anxious steps, staring constantly at the ground, on the lookout for things that crept and crawled. Bushes were dangerous, and so were sea grass and rain water. There were little animals everywhere. They could turn up between the covers of a book, flattened and dead, for the fact is that creeping animals, tattered animals, and dead animals are with us all our lives, from beginning to end. Grandmother tried to discuss this with her, to no avail. Irrational terror is so hard to deal with. [p. 136]”

“It is still summer, but the summer is no longer alive. It has come to a standstill; nothing withers, and fall is not ready to begin. There are no stars yet, just darkness.”

“One summer morning at sunrise a long time agoI met a little girl with a book under her arm.I asked her why she was out so early andshe answered that there were too many books andfar too little time. And there she was absolutely right.”

“But he thought all the strange words were beautiful, and he had never had a book of his own before.”

“I need to write down my observations. Even the tiniest ones; they're the most important.”

“Why are you in such a rush?" Sophia asked, and her grandmother answered that it was a good idea to do things before you forgot that they had to be done.”