“In the years when he'd worked full-time, he'd never complained about frozen or takeout or preprepared dinners. To Caroline it probably seemed that he was changing the rules on her. But to Gary it seemed that the nature of family life itself was changing - that togetherness and filiality and fraternity weren't valued the way they were when he was young.”

“Why must he mistrust his life just when he was more its master than he'd been in years?.”

“In his wolf-skin he was as strong as any of them, but he was a gentle person in many ways. He'd feel so bad about failing he'd probably step aside for someone else without a fight.”

“In every letter, in every line, she saw him. He hadn't changed - he'd only grown into the man he'd meant to be.”

“She had never thought about her name much before, but when he said it, it was as if she were hearing it for the first time - the hard T, the caress of the double S, the way it seemed to end on a breath.”

“The other day, there was a man outside, beckoning to what I though was Has Wounds. … He came back with an older man … he was crying and sobbing, and — he's Has Wounds' owner! … I told him about what I had done … He said that he's been praying for her all of this time too. He'd been crying, he'd been singing — and he thought he was alone in alll this. The nights when I'd wondered … where she was, corresponded with days where he'd wondered where she'd gone. … And this man had cared for her for 16 years! … I said how I had named her, and he said that in 16 years he had never come up with a name for her, because nothing seemed to suit her, and he was amazed to reveal that that was very much her, and he's going to call her that from now on! He begged to repay me somehow … I said listen, the best thing you can do is what you have already done — love her, take care of her, be her owner! …”

“He played of love and loss and years of silence, words unsaid and vows unspoken, and all the spaces between his heart and theirs; and when he was done, and he'd set the violin back in its box, Will's eyes were closed, but Tessa's were full of tears.”

“The name she gave was Caroline
Daughter of a miner
Her ways were free
It seemed to me
That sunshine walked beside her”

“He could do this. He'd survived boot camp. He'd survived combat and the harsh weather of Afghanistan. He could survive broccoli. Probably.”

“A man who is used to acting in one way never changes; he must come to ruin when the times, in changing, no longer are in harmony with his ways.”