…she was discovering once again that reading and writing were not the same — you couldn't just soak it up then squeeze it out again.

The future rose up ahead of her, a succession of empty days, each more daunting and unknowable than the one before her.

I really was a terrible actor. I did it for years in my twenties because it was like being at university again.

You've got to stop letting women slip drugs into your mouth, Dex, it's unhygienic. And dangerous. One day it'll be a cyanide capsule.

She glanced across to where Tilly and her brand new husband were posing for photographs, Tilly fluttering a fan coquettishly in front of her face. 'Unfortunately I didn't realise there was a French Revolutionary theme.' 'The Marie-Antoinette thing?' said Dexter. 'Well at least we know there'll be cake.

What must that be like? To be admired before you’ve even said a word, to be desired two or three hundred times a day by people who have absolutely no idea what you’re like?

I want my best friend back, she thinks, because without him nothing is good and nothing is right.