How much more courage it took to be kind than to be cruel.

I'm just like this. I have no talent for choosing my battles. Life seems, strangely, like a battle to me. The whole thing.

Where there is love there is courage, where there is courage there is peace, where there is peace there is God. And when you have God, you have everything.

To be honest, the only thing I ever really wanted to be was a writer - since I read 'Charlotte's Web' as a child.

Her voice was slightly accented but her French was perfect. Someone who'd not just learned the language but loved it. And it showed with every syllable. Gamache knew it was impossible to split language from culture. That without one the other withered. To love the language was to respect the culture.

I had to learn compassion. Had to learn what it felt like to hate, and to forgive and to love and be loved. And to lose people close to me. Had to feel deep loneliness and sorrow. And then I could write.

A good novel is a good novel, pointe finale. And I think what I'm writing is exactly that.