Justine," Zoe said, "I don't want to curse anyone." "Of course you don't, you're much too nice. But I don't have that problem.

I'm scared of making the biggest mistake of my life. I'm just trying to figure out what the mistake is.

Well, you missed out on some important protocol, Ella. You can't stand between a Texan and his power tools. We like them. Big ones that drain the national grid. We also like truck-stop breakfasts, large moving objects, Monday night football, and the missionary position. We don't drink light beer, drive Smart cars, or admit to knowing the names of more than about five or six colors. And we don't wax our chests, ever.

Well, I find a strange comfort in the fact that he wouldn't feel this degree of animosity now, had he not loved me so much before.

She smiled at him, though her hazel-green eyes were wary beneath the brim of a sodden hat. Right at that moment, staring at her across the hall, Gideon Shaw, cynic, hedonist, drunkard, libertine, fell hopelessly in love.

But it was too late now. A lifetime too late. A million wishes too late.

You're always looking for some new way to tell the same story, but it's how they get to the happy end that is the challenge and the fun for a writer.