Occasionally, very occasionally, say at four oโclock in the afternoon on a wet Sunday, she feels panic-stricken and almost breathless with loneliness. Once or twice she has been known to pick up the phone to check that it isnโt broken. Sometimes she thinks how nice it would be to be woken by a call in the night: โget in a taxi nowโ or โI need to see you, we need to talkโ. But at the best of times she feels like a character in a Muriel Spark novel โ independent, bookish, sharp-minded, secretly romantic.
David NichollsAnd it was at moments like this that she had to remind herself that she was in love with him, or had once been in love with him, a long time ago.
David NichollsI had made this mistake once before, on a school trip to the Victoria and Albert Museum, when I followed a sign marked WOMEN, thinking it was an exhibition on the changing roles of women in society, and actually ended up standing in the ladies' toilets.
David NichollsYou can live your whole life not realizing that what you're looking for is right in front of you.
David NichollsIf she does have a failing, and it's obviously only a tiny one, it's that she doesn't seem particularly curious about other people, or me, anyway.
David NichollsI know that for every reader who has lost the habit or can't find the time, there are people who've never enjoyed reading and question the value of literature, either as entertainment or education, or believe that a love of books, and of fiction in particular, is sentimental or frivolous.
David Nicholls