In this book, not only is there no happy ending, there is no happy beginning and very few happy things in the middle.

Whenever you are examining someone else's belongings, you are bound to learn many interesting things about the person of which you were not previously aware.

But the world did not match the picture in my head, and instead I was with a strange, uncombed person, overlooking a sea without water and a forest without trees.

There is no worse sound in the world than someone who cannot play the violin but insists on doing so anyway.

If you have ever had a miserable experience, then you have probably had it said to you that you would feel better in the morning. This, of course, is utter nonsense, because a miserable experience remains a miserable experience even on the loveliest of morning.

If you have ever slept in a covered casserole dish on the highest peak of a mountain range, then you know that it is an uncomfortable place to lay one's head, even if you find a dish towel inside it that can serve as a blanket.

I met [my editor] in a bar where alcoholic beverages are served and I bought her one and I told her the idea. And she said that she liked it very much, which embarrassed me because I thought it meant that she was a lightweight and that in the morning, as so many women say to so many men, what seems like a good idea, you know, turns out not to be.