Life wasn't about becoming, was it? It was about being.

Sylvie's knowledge, like Izzie's, was random yet far-ranging, 'The sign that one has acquired one's learning from reading novels rather than an education.

No point in thinking, you just have to get on with life. We only have one after all, we should try and do our best. We can never get it right, but we must try.

Alternate history fascinates me, as it fascinates all novelists, because 'What if?' is the big thing.

Most people muddled through events and only in retrospect realized their significance.

Ursula craved solitude but she hated loneliness, a conundrum that she couldn’t even begin to solve.

Why do cats sleep so much? Perhaps they've been trusted with some major cosmic task, an essential law of physics - such as: if there are less than five million cats sleeping at any one time the world will stop spinning.