While Max appears to greatly admire Wallace as a writer and feel compassion for him as a man, he is never starry-eyed, or pulls his punches. Every Love Story is a Ghost Story is as illuminating, multifaceted, and serious an estimation of David Foster Wallace's life and work as we can hope to find.

By investing others with the power to dictate who you are, you rob yourself of an opportunity to truly grow.

Anthony Doerr again takes language beyond mortal limits.

Don't be a fool, there is no such thing as just a girl.

You know what they say - sleep is the mother's drug of choice, but like heroin, only the very rich and the very poor can afford it.

A single girl who needs nobody makes people uncomfortable, and my mom is right in this, appearance is everything, and appearing to have no one is like swimming alone in the middle of the ocean with a flesh wound.

I focus best and am most productive when I’m working in a friend’s empty apartment. It’s hard for me to work at home. Too easy to procrastinate online, too easy to be distracted by the state of perpetual domestic chaos that rules my home.