[Fairy tales] are like a journey to the woods and the many ways you can get lost. Some people say it's not a good idea to read fairy tales to anyone under the age of eight because they are brutal and raw. When I was a kid I often felt that kids's books were speaking down to me, but I never felt that way about fairy tales. They are bloody and scary, but so is life.

Sometimes the right thing feels all wrong until it is over and done with.

No one knows how to write a novel until it's been written

Remember what I've told you. Remember me.

I saw the end of his life right there in that single moment. His pride, his decency, his secrets, his death.

That was the way love was, invisible, there whether or not you wanted to see it or admit to it.

The nature of love had totally escaped her until now. She had thought that if you lost it, you could never get it back, like a stone thrown down a well. But it was like the water at the bottom of the well, there when you can't even see it, shifting in the dark.