Then she had been a fiancee, a young wife, and a mother, and she had discovered that these words were far too small ever to contain the experience.

Norah watched him, serious and utterly absorbed in his task, overcome by the simple fact of his existence.

She had died at age twelve, and by now she was nothing but the memory of love-- nothing, now, but bones.

He fished in his pocket for his keys and instead pulled out the last geode, gray and smooth, earth-shaped. He held it, warming in his palm, thinking of all mysteries the world contained: layers of stone, concealed beneath the flesh of earth and grass; these dull rocks, with their glimmering hidden hearts.

You can't spend the rest of your life tiptoeing around to try and avert disaster. It won't work. You'll just end up missing the life you have.

He had never even glimpsed her.

It seemed there was no end at all to the lies a person could tell, once she got started.