Let me tell you a secret: there is no such thing as an uninteresting life One day you must tell me your full and complete story, unabridged and unexpurgated.We will set aside some time for it, and meet. It's very important. Maneck smiled. 'Why is it important?' It's extremely important because it helps to remind yourself of who you are. Then you can go forward, without fear of losing yourself in this ever-changing world.

...you have to use your failures as stepping stones to success. You have to maintain a fine balance between hope and despair. In the end it’s all a question of balance.

Distance was a dangerous thing, she knew. Distance changed people.

There didn't seem to her any harm in it, and the make-believe was so comforting.

I met my wife when we were both 19 or 20, at a music school where she was taking voice and piano lessons and I was doing classes in music theory and composition.

Birth and death - what could be more monstrous than that? We like to deceive ourselves and call it wondrous and beautiful and majestic, but it's freakish, let's face it.

Where humans are concerned, the only emotion that made sense was wonder, at their ability to endure.