There were events that stuck in my mind. One, for example, was the case of the missing palace seal at the beginning of winter.’ ‘Oh the poor animal,’ she cried out, ‘they’re such beautiful creatures.’ ‘I’m speaking of the royal seal placed on correspondence, as you would know,’ he said.

He knows bad days. Bad days take him completely by surprise. They make him not trust the good days because it's likely something is lurking twenty-four hours away.

They always prided themselves on looking youthful. “Forty’s the new thirty,” they’d joke. Until heartbreak and grief enter your life, and then forty’s the new one hundred.

I recognise Santangelo's dad, who saves police brutality for when he gets to his son.

No stories or explanations,' Finnikin had once told him. 'When it comes to women, straight into an apology and you will find the rest of your life bearable.

You can't think for other people. Nor can you feel for them or be them. They have to do that for themselves.

I used to tell your mother she looked like Sophia Lauren." He looks at me, frowning, and then it registers. "Oh God, some guy's using that line on you, isn't he?" "Not just 'some guy'." I tell him. "The guy.