David Nicholls citations

Page 2

“Today. This bright new day that awaits us”

“A moment passed, perhaps half a second when their faces said what they felt, and then Emma was smiling, laughing, her arms around his neck.”

“For some time now she has had the conviction that life is about to change if only because it must….”

“As the possibility of a relationship had faded, Emma had endeavored to harden herself to Dexter's indifference and these days a remark like this caused no more pain than, say, a tennis ball thrown sharply at the back of her head.”

“She shouldn't speak her thoughts; nothing good ever came of speaking your thoughts.”

“Sometimes, when it is going badly, she wonders if what she believes to be a love of the written word is really just a fetish for stationary.”

“Whatever happens tomorrow, we've had today.”

“Things should look right, Fun; there should be a lot of fun and no more sadness than absolutely necessary”

“You can't throw away years of your life because it makes a funny anecdote.”

“Maybe we've grown out of each other.”

“Don’t keep fighting battles that are already lost.”

“So do you think it's true what they say? About girls liking bastards?'
'He's not a bastard. He's an idiot.'
'Do girls like idiots then?”

“Once you decide not to worry about that stuff anymore, dating and relationships and love and all that, it's like you're free to get on with real life.”

“These days grief seems like walking on a frozen river; most of the time he feels safe enough, but there is always that danger that he will plunge through.”

“I'm just not prepared to be treated like this anymore.'
'Treated like what?'
She sighed, and it was a moment before she spoke. 'Like you always want to be somewhere else, with someone else.”

“She glanced at the other diners, all of them going into their act, and thought is this what it all boils down to? Romantic love, is this all it is, a talent show?”

“Why can’t you just love me? Why can’t you just be in love with me?”

“From an evolutionary point of view, most emotions - fear, desire, anger - serve some practical purpose, but nostalgia is a useless, futile thing because it is a longing for something that is permanently lost….”

“In the future, I'll be braver, she told herself. In the future, I will always speak my mind, eloquently, passionately.”

“And you stupid, stupid woman, stupid for caring, stupid for thinking that he cared.”

“All young people worry about things, it's a natural and inevitable part of growing up, and at the age of sixteen my greatest anxiety in life was that I'd never again achieve anything as good, or pure, or noble, or true, as my O-level results.”

“He wanted to live life in such a way that if a photograph were taken at random, it would be a cool photograph. Things should look right. Fun; there should be a lot of fun and no more sadness than absolutely necessary.”

“Salmon. Salmon, salmon, salmon, salmon. I eat so much salmon at these weddings, twice a year I get this urge to swim upstream.”

“She wondered if she was doomed to be one of those people who spend their lives trying things.”

“… and once again Dexter is struck by how easy conversation can be when no-one is in their right mind”

“These days the nights and mornings have a tendency to bleed into one another.”

“This isn't a letter, it's a gift.”

“As a matter of fact, I think there are more things important in life than "relationships.”

“We're not ourselves, are we? I'm certainly not myself, not anymore. And you're not either. You don't seem yourself. Not as I remember you.”