“I've come to think of Europe as a hardcover book, America as the paperback version.”

“She read books quickly and compulsively, paperback after paperback, as if she might drift away without the anchor of the printed page.”

“A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return.”

“I've never left Ireland, really, you know you come here, come to America, I mean for Irish people America is kind of a promise land" … "It's the milk and honey ya know and we've always had this feeling for this country and the country I think has a feeling for our band”

“I think of my pile of old paperbacks, their pages gone wobbly, like they'd once belonged to the sea.”

“And just because I've written this book, don't think I've changed. I'm like I was back then, really.”

“I am not attacking any particular version of God or gods. I am attacking God, all gods, anything and everything supernatural, wherever and whenever they have been or will be invented. (p. 57 of the Black Swan paperback edition of 2007)”

“Everything that's in [my] books comes out of what I've seen, or touched, or felt, or smelt, and if I had one wish it would be that the books were fiction.”

“She wanted to be buried in a coffin filled with used paperbacks.”

“I've never seen anyone get so excited over books before. You'd think they were diamonds.”