The key to contentment was to never ask why; she had learned that long ago.

People like to think the younger generation's job is to steer the world to hell. But it's never true, is it? They're hopeful and good - and that's how it should be.

Oh, I wish I organized my books. But I don't. I'm not an organized person. The best I can do is put the books I really like in one sort of general area, and poetry in another.

Or maybe, he thought, returning to the boxes, it was part of being Catholic--you were made to feel guilty about everything

And it was too late. No one wants to believe something is too late, but it is always becoming too late, and then it is.

Oh, gosh, Olive. I'm so embarrassed." "No need to be," Olive tells her. "We all want to kill someone at some point." (179)

I'm so interested in the fact that we really don't know anybody. We think we know the people close to us, but we don't, we really don't.