"You could never be certain what you would find in a book that had spent time with someone else."
- Erica Bauermeister
"While the egg yolks cooled, he directed the beaters at the egg whites, setting the mixer on high speed that sent small bubbles giggling to the side of the bowl, where a few became many until they were..."
"Stories of her children when they were small, their round little bodies barely containing their personalities, which bloomed and glittered and melted into her."
"It was interesting. Isabelle thought, the children that chose you. Some come through your body; others came in cars in the middle of the night."
"She found herself wondering at what point in her life she had ceased to be Gulliver and had become the strings holding him to the ground."
"TIME WENT ON, life with the children unfolding in its own ecosystem, small plastic toys seeming to grow up from the carpet like mushrooms, clothes falling to the floor like autumn leaves. Every once i..."
"You know," Marion said, "I met a woman once when I was a teenager. I knew she had gone through a lot but she was so strong, so compassionate. I asked her how she could be the way she was, and you know..."
"When Sean died she understood for the first time how completely human beings were dependent upon a suspension of disbelief in order to simply move forward through their days. If that suspension falter..."
"She simply didn't have an interest in men anymore. It wasn't that she didn't like them, she just knew how easily they broke."
"You're not traveling if you already know everything."