My life is a pitiful, mechanical thing without a past, like a little wind-up car, ready to run in any direction someone points me.

...whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. And peace will be with you.

You don't think you'll live past it and you don't really. The person you were is gone. But the half of you that's still alive wakes up one day and takes over again.

I struggle with confidence, every time. I’m never completely sure I can write another book. Maybe my scope is too grand, my questions too hard, surely readers won’t want to follow me here. A novel is like a cathedral, it knocks you down to size when you enter into it.

I could never work out whether we were to view religion as a life-insurance policy or a life sentence.

you can't really know the person standing before you, because always there is some missing piece

I know how people are, with their habits of mind. Most will sail through from cradle to grave with a conscience clean as snow...I know people. Most have no earthly notion of the price of a snow-white conscience.