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The Night Is Falling Down Around Us. Meteors Rain Like Fireworks, Quick Rips In The Seam Of The Dark... Every Second, Another Streak Of Silver Glows: Parentheses, Exclamation Points, Commas - A Whole Grammar Made Of Light, For Words Too Hard To Speak.

-Jodi Picoult

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The Night Is Falling

Jodi Picoult

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The Night Is Falling Down Around Us. Meteors Rain Like Fireworks, Quick Rips In The Seam Of The Dark... Every Second, Another Streak Of Silver Glows: Parentheses, Exclamation Points, Commas - A Whole Grammar Made Of Light, For Words Too Hard To Speak.

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More From Jodi Picoult

You Can Believe Something Really Hard,' Faith Says, 'and Still Be Wrong.

Forgiving Isn't Something You Do For Someone Else. It's Something You Do For Yourself. It's Saying, 'you're Not Important Enough To Have A Stranglehold On Me.' It's Saying, 'you Don't Get To Trap Me In The Past. I Am Worthy Of A Future.

I Don't Have To Live The Lives Of My Characters To Write About Them. It's About Really Putting Yourself In Their Shoes.

If I Have Gained Anything Over These Months, It Is The Knowledge There Is No Starting Over - Only Living With The Mistakes You've Made. But Then, Caleb Taught Me Long Ago You Can't Build Anything Without Some Sort Of Foundation. Maybe We Learn To Live Our Lives By Understanding, Firsthand, How Not To Live Them.

Somewhere Along The Line, Organized Religion Stopped Being About Faith, And Started Being About Who Had The Power To Keep The Faith. You Said That The Purpose Of Religion Was To Bring People Together. But Does It, Really? Or Does It-knowingly, Purposefully, And Intentionally--break Them Apart?

I Didn't Think I Could Possibly Love Another Baby As Much As I Loved The One I'd Already Had," I Continue. "but The Strangest Thing Happened When I Held You For The First Time. It Was Like My Heart Suddenly Unfolded. Like There Was This Secret Space I Didn't Even Know Existed, And There Was Room For Both Of You." I Stare At Her. "once My Feelings Were Stretched Like That, There Was No Going Back. Without You, It Just Would Have Felt Empty.

To Be Truly Popular, It Has To Look Like Something You Are, When In Reality, It's What You Make Yourself.

In Books, You Always Know What's Coming Next. There Are No Surprises.

That's Why We Read Fiction, Isn't It? To Remind Us That Whatever We Suffer, We're Not The Only Ones?

I Don't Believe In Writer's Block. Think About It - When You Were Blocked In College And Had To Write A Paper, Didn't It Always Manage To Fix Itself The Night Before The Paper Was Due? Writer's Block Is Having Too Much Time On Your Hands.

Some Lessons Can't Be Taught, They Simply Have To Be Learned.

It's The Child Who's Supposed To Cry, And The Mom Who Makes It All Better, Not The Other Way Around, Which Is Why Mothers Will Move Heaven And Earth To Hold It Together In Front Of Their Own Kids.

I Wonder If You've Got A Minute." I Have Many Minutes, All Of Them Used Toward A Common Purpose.

I Used To Believe Everything My Brother Told Me, Because He Was Older And I Figured He Knew More About The World. But As It Turns Out, Being A Grown-up Doesn’t Mean You’re Fearless. It Just Means You Fear Different Things.

Everyone Thinks You Make Mistakes When You're Young. But I Don't Think We Make Any Fewer When We're Grown Up

The Best Way To Prevent A Heartache Was To Cushion The Coming Blow.

You Can Tell Yourself That You Would Be Willing To Lose Everything You Have In Order To Get Something You Want. But It's A Catch-22: All Of Those Things You're Willing To Lose Are What Make You Recognizable. Lose Them, And You've Lost Yourself.

But I Didn't Frame It; I Put Into An Envelope And Sealed It And Stuffed It Far Back Into A Corner Drawer Of A Filing Cabinet. It's There, Just In Case One Of These Days I Start To Lose Her. There Might Be A Morning When I Wake Up And Her Face Isn't The First Thing I See. Or A Lazy August Afternoon When I Can't Quite Recall Anymore Where The Freckles Were On Her Right Shoulders. Maybe One Of These Days, I Will Not Be Able To Listen To The Sound Of Snow Falling And Hear Her Footsteps.

The Real Power Of A Wolf Isn't In Its Fearsome Jaws, Which Can Clench With Fifteen Hundred Pounds Of Pressure Per Square Inch. The Real Power Of A Wolf Is Having That Strength, And Knowing When Not To Use It.

It Was One Thing To Sacrifice Your Own Life For Someone Else's. It Was Another Thing Entirely To Bring Into The Mix A Third Party - A Third Party Who Knew You, Who Trusted You Implicitly.

If You Want To See God Laugh, Make A Plan.

Bleeding Heart, He’d Called Her. Well. He Should Know. He’d Been The First To Rip It To Pieces.

They Don't Like The Thought Of Someone Else Making Demands On The Person Whom They See As Belonging Entirely To Them.

Domestic Violence

What Makes A Treasure A Treasure." Marine Replied, "is How Rare A Find It Is, When You Need It The Most.

Where Did You Go?" "to The End Of The Driveway," My Mother Says. "i Was Nine Months Pregnant; That Was The Maximum Distance I Could Waddle Without Feeling As If My Uterus Was Falling Out." I Wince. "do You Have To Be Quite So Graphic?" "what Would You Like Me To Call It, Zoe? A Fetal Living Room?

They Say That There Are Moments That Open Up Your Life Like A Walnut Cracked, That Change Your Point Of View So That You Never Look At Things The Same Way Again.

Was There A Language Of Loss? Did Everyone Who Suffered Speak A Different Dialect?

You Don't Have To Say I Love You To Say I Love You," You Said With A Shrug. "all You Have To Do Is Say My Name And I Know." ..."can't You Hear It?" You Said. "when You Love Someone, You Say Their Name Different. Like It's Safe Inside Your Mouth.

When You Love Someone

I Can Give Or Take Elephants; I Never Can Find The Cheetah-but The Zebras Captivate Me. They'd Be One Of The Few Things That Would Fit If We Were Lucky Enough To Live In A World That's Black Or White.

Life Could Take On Any Number Of Shapes While You Were Busy Fighting Your Own Demons. But If You Were Changing At The Same Rate As The Person Beside You, Nothing Else Really Mattered. You Became Each Other's Constant.

Here I Am, Wasting Away Inside A Book I Wish I Could Escape, And All She Wants To Do Is Stay In The Story. If I Could Talk To This Girl Delilah, I’d Ask Her Why On Earth She Would Ever Trade A Single Second Of The World She’s In For The One In Which I’m Stuck

And I Remembered Something Else That Makes Us Human: Faith, The Only Weapon In Our Arsenal To Battle Doubt.

This Isn't A Lie, Actually. I Don't Care Why Edward Left. All I Really Want To Know Is Why I Wasn't Enough To Make Him Stay.

Raw Love, Like Raw Heartache, Could Blindside You.

It Just Goes To Show You: You Can Put Nine Insane Miles Between You And Another Person. You Can Make A Vow To Never Speak His Name. You Can Surgically Remove Someone From Your Life. And Still, He'll Haunt You.

I Watch Her Do The Simplest Things: Brushing Her Hair Into A Ponytail, Feeding The Dog, Tying Sophie's Shoelaces, And I Want To Tell Her What She Means To Me, But I Never Actually Say The Words. After All, To Acknowledge Delia As A Drug, I'd Have To Face The Fact That One Day I Might Have To Go Without Her And This I Can't Do.

Asking Me To Describe My Son Is Like Asking Me To Hold The Ocean In A Paper Cup

I Understand Better Than She'd Imagine That History Is Indelible. You Can Mask It; You Can Patch It Smooth And Clear; But You Always Know What's Hidden Underneath.

That,” She Says, “was Never Here Before.

So Much Of Marriage Was Implicit And Nonverbal. Had I Gotten So Complacent I'd Forgotten To Communicate?

...when They Look At Me, I So Badly Want To Be Who They See.

A Duck Walks Into A Bar And The Bartender Asks, What'll It Be? The Duck Doesn't Answer Because It's A Duck.

I Am An Activist. I Have A Really Big Pulpit With My Fiction And I Love Knowing That I Can Make People Think.

If You Think Of A Relationship As A Living Entity, I Guess It's One Thing If The Missing Two Percent Is, Like, A Fingernail. But When It's The Heart, That's A Whole Different Ball Of Wax.

You Can't Win. Either You Have The Baby And Wear Your Pain On The Outside, Or You Don't Have The Baby, And You Keep That Ache In You Forever

The Thinnest Slice Would Be Teeming With Memories Of A Love So Strong It Turned You Inside Out And Left You Gasping, And Would Be An Identical Match To A Slice Stored In The Heart Of A Soul Mate.

Maybe Fate Isn't The Pond You Swim In But The Fisherman Floating On Top Of It, Letting You Run The Line Wild Until You Are Weary Enough To Be Reeled Back In.

I Tell You This As A Cautionary Tale: Beware Of Getting What You Want. It's Bound To Disappoint You.

Getting What You Want

Cautionary Tales

Words, For All They Were Flimsy And Invisible, Had Great Strength. They Could Be Fortified As A Castle Wall And Sharp As A Foil. They Could Bite, Slap, Shock, Wound. But Unlike Deeds, Words Couldn't Really Help You. No Promise Ever Rescued A Person; It Was The Carrying-through Of It That Brought About Salvation.

But Sometimes, In Order To Win, You Have To Make Sacrifices.

I Learned A Lot That Night. For Example, That Part Of Being The Magician's Assistant Means Coming Face-to-face With Illusion. That Invisibility Is Really Just Knotting Your Body In A Certain Way And Letting The Black Curtain Fall Over You. That People Don't Vanish Into Thin Air; That When You Can't Find Someone, It's Because You've Been Misdirected To Look Elsewhere.

If It's Us", She Whispered, "how Come You Get To Decide?" When He Didn't Answer - Couldn't Answer - She Turned And Stared Out The Front Window. As It Turned Out, They Were Still In The Parking Lot. They Hadn't Gotten Anywhere At All.

I Think I Have Sort Of Gravitated Toward Issues That I Don't Know The Answers To, Because That's What's More Interesting For Me To Write.

Be Kind To Others Before You Take Care Of Yourself; Make Whoever You're With Feel Like They Matter.

I Think There Are Two Different Oceans - The One That Plays With You In The Summer, And The One That Gets So Mad In The Winter.

When Your Existence Is Hell, Death Must Be Heaven.

No Matter Who You Are, There Is Always Some Part Of You That Wishes You Were Someone Else, And When, For A Millisecond, You Get That Wish, It's A Miracle.

Time Is An Optical Illusion- Never Quite As Soild Or Strong As We Think It Is

Optical Illusions

There's Always Going To Be Bad Stuff Out There. But Here's The Amazing Thing -- Light Trumps Darkness, Every Time. You Stick A Candle Into The Dark, But You Can't Stick The Dark Into The Light.

It's Never The Differences Between People That Suprise Us. It's The Things That, Against All Odds, We Have In Common.

She Shrugged. "you Can Be Happy For Someone Else's Good Fortune, But That Doesn't Mean You Forget Your Own Bad Luck.

It Was Like Trying To Bail Out An Ocean Of Water With A Teaspoon.

But If You Seek Forgiveness, Doesn't That Automatically Mean You Cannot Be A Monster? By Definition, Doesn't That Desperation Make You Human Again?

Life Was What Happened When All The What-ifs Didn't.

You Never Forget Your First Fall.

What I Mean Is That Those Thoughts, They're Human. And Just Because You Turn Out Differently Than Everyone's Imagined You Would Doesn't Mean That You've Failed In Some Way. A Kid Who Gets Teased In One School Might Move To A Different One, And Be The Most Popular Girl There, Just Because No One Has Any Other Expectations Of Her. Or A Person Who Goes To Med School Because His Entire Family Is Full Of Doctors Might Find Out That What He Really Wants To Be Is An Artist Instead.

When You Love Someone More Than He Loves You, You'll Do Anything To Switch The Scales. You Dress The Way You Think He'd Like You To Dress. You Pick Up His Favorite Figures Of Expression. You Tell Yourself That If You Re-create Yourself In His Image, Then He'll Crave You In The Same Way You Crave Him.

Remember That Every Fire Will Burn Itself Out, Even Without Your Help.

Take It From Me: Love Has All The Lasting Permanence Of A Rainbow- Beautiful While It's There, And Just As Likely To Have Disappeared By The Time You Blink.

Knowledge Was Power, But A Good Librarian Did Not Hoard The Gift. She Taught Others How To Find, Where To Look, How To See.

Most People Who Offer Their Help Do It To Make Themselves Feel Better, Not Us. To Be Honest, I Don't Blame Them. It's Superstition: If You Give Assistance To The Family In Need... If You Throw Salt Over Your Shoulder... If You Don't Step On The Cracks, Then Maybe You'll Be Immune. Maybe You'll Be Able To Convince Yourself That This Could Never Happen To You.

Just Because You Had Every Right To Feel Sorry For Yourself Didn't Mean You Ever Took The Opportunity To Do So.

Listen, I Would Say, This Is Not How I Thought Our Lives Would Go; And May Be We Cannot Find Our Way Out Of This Alley. But There Is No One I'd Rather Be Lost With.

There's No Way To Convince Her That Just Because You Put Half. Planet Between You And Someone Else, You Can't Drive That Person Out Of Your Thoughts. Believe Me. I've Tried.

What She Hadn't Realized Was That Sometimes When Your Vision Was That Sharp And True, It Could Cut You. That Only If You'd Felt Such Fullness Could You Really Understand The Ache Of Being Empty.

Once The World Was Pulled Out From Beneath Your Feet, Did You Ever Get To Stand On Firm Ground Again?

Real Mothers Don't Just Listen With Humble Embarrassment To The Elderly Lady Who Offers Unsolicited Advice In The Checkout Line When A Child Is Throwing A Tantrum. We Take The Child, Dump Him In The Lady's Cart, And Say, "great. Maybe You Can Do A Better Job." Real Mothers Know That It's Okay To Eat Cold Pizza For Breakfast. Real Mothers Admit It Is Easier To Fail At This Job Than To Succeed.

Nobody Wants To Admit To This, But Bad Things Will Keep On Happening. Maybe That's Beause It's All A Chain, And A Long Time Ago Someone Did The First Bad Thing, And That Led Someone Else To Do Another Bad Thing, And So On. You Know, Like That Game Where You Whisper A Sentence Into Someone's Ear, And That Person Whispers It To Someone Else, And It All Comes Out Wrong In The End. But Then Again, Maybe Bad Things Happen Because It's The Only Way We Can Keep Remembering What Good Is Supposed To Look Like.

Is It Really Worth Dying For The Person You Love?

A Lot Of The Hallmark Behaviors Of Autism - Flat Affect, Stimming, Not Looking Someone In The Eye - Could Very Easily Be Misinterpreted As Signs Of Guilt.

My Grandmother Told Me That Her Father Used To Ask Her A Riddle: What Must You Break Apart In Order To Bring A Family Close Together? Bread, Of Course.

Maybe You Had To Leave In Order To Really Miss A Place; Maybe You Had To Travel To Figure Out How Beloved Your Starting Point Was.

It Doesn't Matter What It Is That Leaves A Hole Inside You. It Just Matters That It’s There.

Life Isn't Nearly As Stable As We Want It To Be.

My Sisters Keeper

I Always Wondered Why God Was Supposed To Be A Father," She Whispers. Fathers Always Want You To Measure Up To Something. Mothers Are The Ones Who Love You Unconditionally, Don't You Think?

When She Smiles, It Feels Like The First Warm Day Of March-- After An Eternity Of Snow, When You Suddenly Remember How Summer Feels On The Backs Of Your Bare Calves & In The Part Of Your Hair.

Since It Had Gotten So Quiet In The Room That You Could Hear The Sound Of Your Own Doubts.

Tradionally, Parents Made Decisions For A Child, Because Presumably They Are Looking Out For His Or Her Best Interests. But If They Are Blinded, Instead, By The Best Interests Of Another One Of Their Children, The System Breaks Down.

Why Do Some Memories Bleed Out Of Nowhere And Others Stay Locked Behind Doors?

That's Because You've Never Been One. You Haven't Spent Years Wearing Someone Else's Clothes, Taking Someone Else's Name, Living In Someone Else's Houses, And Working Someone Else's Job To Fit In. And If You Don't Sell Out, Then You Run Away... Proving You're The Gypsy They Said You Were All Along.

When I Was Little, The Great Mystery To Me Was Not How Babies Were Made, But Why?

Sometimes You Can See Things Happen Right In Front Of Your Eyes And Still Jump To The Wrong Conclusions.

I Think People Do Things All The Time In The Name Of Love That They Shouldn't Be Doing - Such Is The Nature Of Us.

We're [parents]) Always Bluffing, Pretending We Know Best, When Most Of The Time We're Just Praying We Won't Screw Up Too Badly.

When The News You Don't Want To Hear Is Looming Before You Like Everest, Two Things Can Happen. Tragedy Can Run You Through Like A Sword, Or It Can Become Your Backbone. Either You Fall Apart And Sob, Or You Say, 'right. What's Next?

How Foolish It Is To Run Away With A Man Who's Already Run Away With Someone Else.

You Know What The Difference Is Between A Dream And A Goal?... A Plan.

Every Year I Tell Myself That I’m Not Going To Read Any Reviews And Then I Do. We’re All Human And When I Read Something Negative It Hurts. I Think When You Write It’s Part Of The Game, You’re Going To Get Some Good Reviews And Some Bad Reviews And That’s How It Goes. I Don’t Write For The Reviews.

The Problem Was, You Couldn't Have One Without The Other. There Couldn't Be A Bad Guy Unless There Was A Good Guy To Create The Standard. And There Couldn't Be A Good Guy Until A Bad Guy Showed Just How Far Off The Path He Might Stray.

She Stared At Peter, And She Realized That In That One Moment, When She Hadn't Been Thinking, She Knew Exactly What He'd Felt As He Moved Through The School With His Backpack And His Guns. Every Kid In This School Played A Role: Jock, Brain, Beauty, Freak. All Peter Had Done Was What They All Secretly Dreamed Of: Be Someone, Even For Just Nineteen Minutes, Who Nobody Else Was Allowed To Judge.

History Could Hover, Like A Faint Perfume Or A Memory Stamped On The Back Of One's Eyelids.

You’ll Tell Yourself Anything You Have To, To Pretend That You’re Still The One In Control.

Sometimes Chris Wished He Could Sneak A Peek At The Back Of The Book, So To Speak, And See How It Was All Going To Turn Out, So That He Wouldn't Have To Bother Going Through The Motions.

Africa - You Can See A Sunset And Believe You Have Witnessed The Hand Of God. You Watch The Slope Lope Of A Lioness And Forget To Breathe. You Marvel At The Tripod Of A Giraffe Bent To Water. In Africa, There Are Iridescent Blues On The Wings Of Birds That You Do Not See Anywhere Else In Nature. In Africa, In The Midday Heart, You Can See Blisters In The Atmosphere. When You Are In Africa, You Feel Primordial, Rocked In The Cradle Of The World.

It Was Nice Not Having To Be The One In Control, For A Little While. It Was Nice To Be The One Who Was Protected, Instead Of The One Who'd Been Protecting Eveyone Else.

When You're Pregnant, You Can Think Of Nothing But Having Your Own Body To Yourself Again; Yet After Giving Birth You Realize That The Biggest Part Of You Is Now Somehow External, Subject To All Sorts Of Dangers And Disappearance, So You Spend The Rest Of Your Life Trying To Figure Out How To Keep Her Close Enough For Comfort. That's The Strange Thing About Being A Mother: Until You Have A Baby, You Don't Even Realize How Much You Were Missing One.

Because Hate's Just The Flip Side Of Love. Like Heads And Tails On A Dime. If You Don't Know What It Feels Like To Love Someone, How Would You Know What Hate Is? One Can't Exist Without The Other.

Maybe Honesty Is Overvalued. What's Truly Priceless Is Picking Out From A Stream Of Falsehoods The Ones You Most Need To Hear.

If You Want To Know Someone's Story, They Have To Tell It Aloud. But Every Time, The Telling Is A Little But Different. It's New, Even To Me.

But You Could Only Remake Your Own Future, Not Anyone Else's, And For Some People That Just Wasn't Good Enough.

You Don't Love Someone Because They're Perfect," She Says. "you Love Them In Spite Of The Fact That They're Not." I Don't Know How To Respond To That; It's Like Being Told After Thirty-five Years That The Sky, Which I've Seen As A Brilliant Blue, Is In Fact Rather Green.

I Would Tell Them That When You Look At A Person, You Never Know What The're Hiding.

Be A Good Listener, Don't Judge And Don't Put Boundaries On Someone Else's Grief.

It Does'nt Matter Who Forgives You, If You're The One Who Can't Forget.

When You Love Someone, You Don't See Parts Of Him You Don't Like.

When You Love Someone

We Dont Have To Accept Each Others Beliefs..but We Do Have To Accept Each Others Right To Believe Them.

Hope And Reality Lie In Inverse Proportions, Inside The Walls Of A Hospital... Doubt Is Like Dye. Once Is Spreads Into The Fabric Of Excuses You've Woven, You'll Never Get Rid Of The Stain.

Imagine A World That Seemed So Much Bigger Than You. Imagine Waking Up One Morning And Finding A Piece Of Yourself You Didn't Even Know Existed.

Logical Thinking Keeps You From Wasting Time Worrying, Or Hoping. It Prevents Disappointment. Imagination, On The Other Hand, Only Gets You Hyped Up Over Things That Will Never Realistically Happen.

I Love Getting Fan Mail. Often, As A Writer, You Never Know What Your Readers Think Of A Book... You Get Critical Reviews And Sales Figures, But None Of That Is The Same As Knowing You've Made A Person Stay Up All Night Reading, Or Helped Them Have A Good Cry, Or Really Touched Their Life.

You Know How Hind-sight Is 20/20? Love Is When You Look Back And Wouldn't Change Anything.

I Have No Idea What Andrew Might Have Done, And I Do Not Ask. She Believes That I Can Fix This, And Like Always, That's Enough To Make Me Think That I Can. "i'll Take Care Of It,: I Say, When What I Really Mean Is: I'll Take Care Of You.

Why Are Terms Of Endearment Always Food? Honey, Cookie, Sugar, Pumpkin. Its Not Like Caring About Someone Is Enough To Actually Sustain You.

How Could You Not Want To Draw Breath One More Day? How Could Your Own Life Be Such A Cheap Commodity? But Then I Started To Understand: When Your Existence Is Hell, Death Must Be Heaven.

There Are Legions Of Us, I Realized. The Mothers Who Have Broken Babies, And Spend The Rest Of Our Lives Wondering If We Should Have Spared Them. And The Mothers Who Have Let Their Broken Babies Go, Who Look At Our Children And See Instead The Faces Of The Ones They Never Met.

I Know What Love Is. When You Find The Person You Are Supposed To Love, Bells Ring And Fireworks Go Off In Your Head And You Can't Find The Words To Speak And You Think About Him All The Time. When You Find The Person You Are Supposed To Love, You Will Know By Staring Deeply Into Their Eyes.

Eric Understands That The World Is Rarelythe Way It Is Supposed To Be. And He Knows That, Given The Chance, We Don't Have To Wait For Someone To Make Messes Of Our Lives. We Do A Good Enough Job, Ourselves.

If She Spoke, She Would Tell Him The Truth: She Was Not Okay At All, But Horribly Empty, Now That She Knew What It Was Like To Be Filled.

I Personally Subscribe To The Belief That Normal Is Just A Setting On The Dryer.

Ross Held Her Face Between His Hands And Kissed Her. He Tasted Doubt On Her Tongue And Pain On The Roof Of Her Mouth. He Swallowed These, And Drank Again. Consumed, She Had No Choice But To See How Empty He Was Inside, And How, Sip By Sip, She Filled Him.

Dead Isn’t Angels Or Ghosts. It’s A Physical State Of Breakdown, A Change In All Those Carbon Atoms That Create The Temporary House Of A Body So That They Can Return To Their Most Elemental Stage.

I Don't Know What He Means By That, But I Nod And Smile At Him. You'd Be Surprised At How Far That Response Can Get You In A Conversation Where You Are Completely Confused.

Heroes Didn't Leap Tall Buildings Or Stop Bullets With An Outstretched Hand; They Didn't Wear Boots And Capes. They Bled, And They Bruised, And Their Superpowers Were As Simple As Listening, Or Loving. Heroes Were Ordinary People Who Knew That Even If Their Own Lives Were Impossibly Knotted, They Could Untangle Someone Else's. And Maybe That One Act Could Lead Someone To Rescue You Right Back.

She's Not Like Anyone I've Ever Seen Before. When I'm Not With Her, I Want To Be. And When She Opens The Book And I See Her Face, I Can Barely Remember What I'm Supposed To Say, Much Less How To Speak At All." I Test The Words On My Tongue. "i Think I Might Be In Love With Her. But How Can I Really Know, Since The Only Love I've Ever Experienced Was Written For Me?

I Am Always Consulted About Covers, And Give Feedback, But I Am Also Aware That What Causes A Customer To Pick A Book Up Off A Shelf In The Uk Is Very Different From What Causes A Customer To Pick A Book Up In The Us.

Maybe There Is More To A Person Than A Body And A Mind. Maybe Something Else Figures Into The Mix— Not A Soul, Exactly, But A Spirit That Hints You Might One Day Be Greater, Stronger Than You Are Now. A Promise; A Potential.

There's Some Illogical Part Of Me That Still Believes If You Want Superman To Show Up, First There's Got To Be Someone Worth Saving.

Parenting Isn't A Noun But A Verb--an Ongoing Process Instead Of An Accomplishment. And That No Matter How Many Years You Put Into The Job, The Learning Curve Is, Well, Fairly Flat.

His Hand Is Cool On My Cheek As He Paints A Tear Beneath My Left Eye, Dark Blue And Swollen With Sorrow.

She Had Loved Him. He Knew This; He Had Never Doubted It. But She Had Also Asked Him To Kill Her. If You Love Someone That Much, You Did Not Lay That Sort Of Burden On Him For The Rest Of His Life.

If You Love Someone

Happiness Is What You Choose To Remember.

If You Gave Someone Your Heart And They Died, Did They Take It With Them? Did You Spend The Rest Of Forever With A Hole Inside You That Couldn't Be Filled?

The First Time Someone I Loved Left Me Behind...i Didn't Know How My Family Would Balance. We Had Been Such A Sturdy Little End Table, Four Solid Legs. I Was Sure We Would Now Be Off-kilter, Always Unstable. Until One Day I Looked More Closely, And Realized That We Had Simply Become A Stool.

You Can Blame Your Ugliness For Keeping People At Bay, When In Reality You're Crippled By The Thought Of Letting Another Person Close Enough To Popentially Scar You Even More Deeply. You Can Tell Yourself That It's Safer To Love Someone Who Will Never Really Love You Back, Because You Can't Lose Someone You Never Had.

That's What Love Is. It's Some Power Greater Than You And Me, That Draws Us To One Special Person

Embarrassment Isn't A Just Cause Of Action.

Then Henry Speaks Again. "did He Do It?" I Turn To Him Slowly. "does It Matter?

Why Are You Doing This To Yourself? When Something Bad Happens, Why Do You Have To Pick At It Until It Bleeds All Over Again?

In Nineteen Minutes You Can Norder A Pizza And Have It Delivered. You Can Read A Story To A Child Or Have Your Oil Changed. You Can Walk A Mile. You Can Sew A Hem. In Nineteen Minutes You Can Get Revenge.

Summertime, I Think, Is A Collective Unconscious. We All Remember The Notes That Made Up The Song Of The Ice Cream Man; We All Know What It Feels Like To Brand Our Thighs On A Playground Slide That's Heated Up Like A Knife In A Fire; We All Have Lain On Our Backs With Our Eyes Closed And Our Hearts Beating Across The Surface Of Our Lids, Hoping That This Day Will Stretch Just A Little Longer Than The Last One, When In Fact It's All Going In The Other Direction.

If You Spent Your Life Concentrating On What Everyone Else Thought Of You, Would You Forget Who You Really Were? What If The Face You Showed The World Turned Out To Be A Mask... With Nothing Beneath It?

It Was Possible That A Miracle Was Not Something That Happened To You, But Rather Something That Didn’t.

You Would Wind Up As A Cat, I Told Her. They Don't Need Anyone Else. I Need You, She Replied. Well, I Said. Maybe I'll Come Back As Catnip.

You May Be Real, But You're Still Stuck In A Book.

In The English Language There Are Orphans And Widows, But There Is No Word For The Parents Who Loses A Child.

I Used To Think I'd Be Just Like Them When I Grew Up, But I Am Not. And The Thing Is, Somewhere Along The Way, I Stopped Wanting To Be Like Them, Anyway.

There Was A Difference Between People Looking At You Because They Wanted To Be Like You, And People Looking At You Because Your Misfortune Brought Them One Rung Higher.

Nowadays, I Dont Have Expectations, And This Way She Beats Them All.

My Friends Say I Have Two Speeds: Fast And Blistering.

I Think That Different Things Sell In Different Countries.

You Can't Exist In This World Without Leaving A Piece Of Yourself Behind.

...because He Believed That If You Wanted To Get Rid Of A Hole, You Filled It. He Had Not Realized At The Time That There Were All Sorts Of Filler That Took Up Space, But Had No Substance. That Made You Feel Just As Empty.

Peter Curled His Hands Into Fists At His Sides. 'kiss Me,' He Said. She Leaned Towards Him Slowly, Until Her Face Was Too Close To Be In Focus. Her Hair Fell Over Peter's Shoulder Like A Curtain And Her Eyes Closed. She Smelled Like Autumn-like Apple Cider And Slanting Sun And The Snap Of The Coming Cold. He Felt His Heart Scrambling, Caught Inside The Confines Of His Own Body. Josie's Lips Landed Just On The Edge Of His, Almost His Cheek And Not Quite His Mouth. 'i'm Glad I Wasn't Stuck In Here Alone,' She Said Shyly, And He Tasted The Words, Sweet As Mint On Her Breath.

The Best Thing About Endings Is Knowing That Just Ahead Is The Daunting Task To Start Over.

There Are Stars In The Night Sky That Look Brighter Than The Others, And When You Look At Them Through A Telescope You Realize You Are Looking At Twins. The Two Stars Rotate Around Each Other, Sometimes Taking Nearly A Hundred Years To Do It. They Create So Much Gravitational Pull There's No Room Around For Anything Else. You Might See A Blue Star, For Example, And Realize Only Later That It Has A White Dwarf As A Companion - That First One Shines So Bright, By The Time You Notice The Second One, It's Too Late.

In Nineteen Minutes, You Can Mow The Front Lawn; Color Your Hair; Watch A Third Of A Hockey Game. In Nineteen Minutes, You Can Bake Scones Or Get A Tooth Filled By A Dentist; You Can Fold Laundry For A Family Of Five. In Nineteen Minutes, You Can Stop The World; Or You Can Just Jump Off It.

Nathaniel Closes His Eyes And Jumps, His Arms Glued To His Sides Like That Fly's. He Doesn't Try To Break His Fall, Just Hits Hard, Because It Hurts Less Than Everything Else.

A Place Like This Wears Down Everything, And Tolerance Is No Exception. In Here, Coexistence Passes For Forgiveness. You Do Not Learn To Like Something You Abhor; You Come To Live With It...you Live And Let Live, And Eventually That Becomes Enough.

Live And Let Live

You Can Be Strapped To The Most Stable Chair And Still Feel The World Give Way Beneath You.

Things Had A Way Of Working Out For The Best When You Let Them Run Their Course.

You Know Why I Think We Still Execute People? Because, Even If We Don't Want To Say It Out Loud-for The Really Heinous Crimes, We Want To Know That There's A Really Heinous Punishment. Simple As That. We Want To Bring Society Closer Together-huddle And Circle Our Wagons-and That Means Getting Rid Of People We Think Are Incapable Of Learning A Moral Lesson. I Guess The Question Is: Who Gets To Identify Those People? And What If, God Forbid, They Got It Wrong?

You Make Yourself Strong Because It's Expected Of You. You Become Confident Because Someone Beside You Is Unsure. You Turn Into The Person Others Need You To Be.

Witness Testimony Is Always Flawed. It's Better Than Circumstantial Evidence, Sure, But People Aren't Camcorders; They Don't Record Every Action And Reaction, And The Very Act Of Remembering Involves Chosing Words, Actions And Images. In Other Words, Any Witness Who Was Supposed To Be Giving A Court Facts Is Really Just Giving Them A Version Of Fiction.

I Consider Myself Spiritual And I'm Married To A Man Who Is Both An Atheist And A Humanist, And My Kids Have Been Raised With The Traditions Of Different Religions, But They Do Not Go To Church Or Temple. My Feeling Is That Everyone Should Be Able To Believe What They Want Or Need To Believe.

You Saved Me," I Said. Nathaniel Put His Hands On Either Side Of My Face. "i Had To," He Said. "so You Could Save Me Back.

Isn't It Amazing How, When You Strip Away Everything, People Are So Much Alike?

Life Was All About Being In A Certain Place, At A Certain Time.

On My License, It Says I'm An Organ Donor, But The Truth Is I'd Consider Being An Organ Martyr. I'm Sure I'm Worth A Lot More Dead Than Alive - The Sum Of The Parts Equal More Than The Whole. I Wonder Who Might Wind Up Walking Around With My Liver, My Lungs, Even My Eyeballs. I Wonder What Poor Asshole Would Get Stuck With Whatever It Is In Me That Passes For A Heart.

I’d Much Rather Pretend I’m Somewhere Else, And Any Time I Open The Pages Of A Book, That Happens.

You Want To Write Something As Good As What You've Read.

The Reason I Am Still Sitting At Josef's Kitchen Table Is The Same Reason Traffic Slows After A Car Wreck- You Want To See The Damage; You Can't Let Yourself Pass Without That Mental Snapshot. We Are Drawn To Horror Even As We Recoil From It.

Talking Out Loud To Fictional Characters Is Just The Tip Of The Iceberg.

Tip Of The Iceberg

The Cost Of Growth Is Always A Small Act Of Violence.

In Half Hour My Mother Has Managed To Give Me What My Father Couldn't: My Past.

It Is So Easy To Presume That While Your Own World Has Ground To An Absolute Halt, So Has Everyone Else's.

Fiction Is Like That, Once It Is Released Into The World: Contagious, Persistent. Like The Contents Of Pandora's Box, A Story That's Freely Given Can't Be Contained Anymore. It Becomes Infectious, Spreading From The Person Who Created It To The Person Who Listens, And Passes It On.

Instead Of Plotting The Demise Of The Traditional Family, As Some Politicians And Religious Leaders Would Have You Believe, Gay People Mow Their Lawns And Watch 'american Idol' And Video Their Children's Concerts And Have The Same Hopes And Dreams That Their Straight Counterparts Do.

Life, It Turns Out, Goes On. There Is No Cosmic Rule That Grants You Immunity From The Details Just Because You Have Come Face-to-face With A Catastrophe. The Garbage Can Still Overflow, The Bills Arrive In The Mail, Telemarketers, Interrupt Dinner.

It Was A Catch-22: If You Didn’t Put The Trauma Behind You, You Couldn’t Move On. But If You Did Put The Trauma Behind You, You Willingly Gave Up Your Claim To The Person You Were Before It Happened.

She Stares At Me For A Moment, And Then She Bursts Out Laughing. “you Haven’t Seen His Perfect Little Wife And His Perfect Little Girls. Believe Me, Oliver, I’m Not The Great Love Of His Life, The One He’ll Never Forget.” “you Are To Me,” I Say.

Grief Is A Curious Thing, When It Happens Unexpectedly. It Is A Band-aid Being Ripped Away, Taking The Top Layer Off A Family. And The Underbelly Of A Household Is Never Pretty, Ours No Exception. There Were Times I Stayed In My Room For Days On End With Headphones On, If Only So That I Would Not Have To Listen To My Mother Cry. There Were The Weeks That My Father Worked Round-the-clock Shifts, So That He Wouldn't Have To Come Home To A House That Felt Too Big For Us.

I Wonder If, As You Get Older, You Stop Missing People So Fiercely. Maybe Growing Up Is Just Focusing On What You've Got, Instead Of What You Don't.

Listen,” She Said. “i May Not Be What You Want Right Now, But I’m All You’ve Got.

I Am Alice In Wonderland', Josie Thought. 'watch Me Fall.

I Close My Eyes, Thinking That There Is Nothing Like An Embrace After An Absence, Nothing Like Fitting My Face Into The Curve Of His Shoulder And Filling My Lungs With The Scent Of Him.

The Apple . . . Came Before Adam And Eve In The Story Of Creation. It Had To Have Been There At Least Three Years Because That's How Long It Takes For A New Tree To Bear Fruit.

Instead Of Doing The Best Thing, We Sometimes Have To Settle For The Rightest Thing.

That's The Paradox Of Loss: How Can Something That's Gone Weigh Us Down So Much?

I Imagine How Cool It Would Be If All Small Talk Wasn't Lies.

She Thought Of Death Like The Seam Of A Hem: Each Time You Lose Someone Close, It Unraveled A Little. You Could Still Go Along With Your Life, But You'd Be Forever Tripping Over Something You Previously Took For Granted.

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