But it does not tell you this: that love will turn the whole world into something greater than itself.

Hunky Heroes, rescuing distressed women, captive princesses, and girls without wheels since 1684. p. 450

That was what her parents did not understand—and had never understood—about stories. Liza told herself storied as though she was weaving and knotting an endless rope. Then, no matter how dark or terrible the pit she found herself in, she could pull herself out, inch by inch and hand over hand, on the long rope of stories.

That is the strangest thing about the world: how it looks so different from every point of view.

I’m with Julian,” I say at last. This, after all, is what I have chosen.

I'd rather die on my own terms than live on theirs. I'd rather die loving Alex than live without him.

For a second I feel a rush of sadness: for the horizons that vanish behind us, for the people we leave behind, the tiny-doll selves that get stored away and ultimately buried.