According to the conventions of the genre, Augustus Waters kept his sense of humor till the end, did not for a moment waiver in his courage, and his spirit soared like an indomitable eagle until the world itself could not contain his joyous soul.

Books belong to their readers.

Like the way the sun is right now, with the long shadows, and that kind of bright, soft light you get when the sun isn't quite setting? That's the light that makes everything better, everything prettier, and today, everything just seemed to be in that light.

I don’t know a perfect person. I only know flawed people who are still worth loving.

You can say a lot of bad things about Alabama, but you can't say that Alabamans as a people are duly afraid of deep fryers.

That didn’t happen, of course. Things never happened the way I imagined them.

"Please stop," I said. "You're upsetting the black Santas."