They were written on cheap blue notebooks bought by poor women. I'm interested in folk tales in the way that medicine and magic in women's stories are all kind of combined.

You build your world around someone, and then what happens when he disappears? Where do you go-into pieces, into atoms, into the arms of another man? You go shopping, you cook dinner, you work odd hours, you make love to someone else on June nights. But you're not really there.

Avoid men who call you Baby, and women who have no friends, and dogs that scratch at their bellies and refuse to lie down at your feet. Wear dark glasses; bathe with lavender oil and cool fresh water. Seek shelter from the sun at noon.

Being human means losing everything we love best in the world," she murmured as she released me. "But would you ask to be anything else?

He believed in dreams, in endings that people told you could never happen, in disappointments reversed and luck that lasted.

Always keep mint on your windowsill in August, to ensure that buzzing flies will stay outside, where they belong. Don't think the summer is over, even when roses droop and turn brown and the stars shift position in the sky. Never presume August is a safe or reliable time of the year.

One of my favorites is "Time and Again" by Jack Finney. It takes place in Manhattan and goes back and forth between 1882 and the 1950s. It's really a cult book.