The wide world was changing, and she wanted a different place in it. Not just wanted, but felt she deserved. If the world didn't owe her a living, as her mother repeatedly warned her, it owed her a break. She had a strong sense that a better, more exciting, more rewarding life than that which had been the lot of her parents and grandparents was hers by right. In this she was guilty of nothing more serious than the arrogance of youth, from which every generation suffers and by which it distinguishes itself from the preceding one.

It might be tough, but my dad used to say, tough times don't last — tough people do.

There is something hugely civilised about allowing long pauses in a conversation. Very few people can stand that kind of silence.

No one can say I didn't pay my dues in life.

Trust the story ... the storyteller may dissemble and deceive, the story can't: the story can only ever be itself.

The dead hand has too long hampered the freedom of the living.

I prefer the pen. There is something elemental about the glide and flow of nib and ink on paper.