Grief was like a terrible burden, but at least you could lay it down by the side of the road and walk away from it. Antonia had come only a few paces, but already she could turn and look back and not weep. It wasn't anything to do with forgetting. It was just accepting. Nothing was ever so bad once you had accepted it.

It was good and nothing good is ever lost.

I'm getting too elderly to travel the length of the country for a free hangover.

Things happen they way they're meant to. There's a pattern and a shape to everything...Nothing happens without a reason...Nothing is impossible...(Page 180).

Life is so extraordinary. Wonderful surprises are just around the most unexpected corners.

There's a war on. We don't know how anything's going to end. We just have to grasp each fleeting moment of joy as it whizzes by.

Grief was like a terrible burden, but at least you could lay it down by the side of the road and walk away from it. Antonia had come only a few paces, but already she could turn and look back and not weep. It wasn't anything to do with forgetting. It was just accepting. Nothing was ever so bad once you had accepted it.