The book was turned to the page with Anne Frank's name, but what got me about it was the fact that right beneath her name there were four Aron Franks. FOUR. Four Aron Franks without museums, without historical markers, without anyone to mourn them. I silently resolved to remember and pray for the four Aron Franks as long as I was around.

I tried to tell myself that it could be worse, that the world was not a wish-granting factory, that I was living with cancer not dying of it, that I mustn't let it kill me before it kills me.

Becoming a father made me much more interested in the parent character in my novels. I've never found parents that interesting.

It seems to me that all the things we keep in sealed boxes are both alive and dead until we open the box, that the unobserved is both there and not.

The Venn Diagram of boys who don’t like smart girls and boys you don’t wanna date is a circle.

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

The past feels distant, even when it's near. The future feels assured, even when it isn't.