He loved the scratching of pencil against paper when he was focused: it meant something was happening.

I feel like my life is so scattered right now. Like it's all the small pieces of paper and someone's turned on the fan. But, talking to you makes me feel like the fan's been turned off for a little bit. Like things could actually make sense. You completely unscatter me, and I appreciate that so much.

It's hard to believe in coincidence, but it's even harder to believe in anything else.

"Nothing," I said. "I’m just…" I couldn’t finish the sentence, didn’t know how to. "I’m just very, very fond of you."

That was part of her, and you used to know it. It's like now you only care about the Alaska you made up.

I kept waiting for that loneliness and nervousness to make me want to go back. But it never did.

I've read a lot of bad books. I used to review books for a living, and when you're a reviewer you read tons of terrible books.