“She had said she was afraid of Perry, and she was, but was it simply Perry she feared, or was it a configuration of which he was part […]? The eldest, the brother she loved, had shot himself; Fern had fallen out of a window, or jumped; and Perry was committed to violence, a criminal.”

“She had fallen in love so many times that she began to suspect she was not falling in love at all, but doing something much more ordinary.”

“She loved him because he had brought her back to life. She had been like a caterpillar in a cocoon, and he had drawn her out and shown her that she was a butterfly.”

“I didn't care as an ex-ballet dancer wrote and told me she had seen the production and fallen in love with my legs. She said that in other circumstances she could have lived happily with my legs but that she only had a small flat in Holland Park.”

“She had been restless and forceful, a killer of the border hills, yet she had a childlike faith in love. She had given herself to him and never doubted the wisdom of the gift as he had sometimes doubted it. She had kept the faith, and she was dead.”

“There is no escape if love is not there," Hannah had said. Had Hannah known when she herself had not even suspected? It was not escape that she had dreamed about, it was love.”

“She had grown older. And he loved her more now than he had loved her when he understood her better, when she was the product of her parents. What she was now was what she herself had decided to become.”

“Another Boring Love Story

She was risky at best.
She had a sordid past.
She was complicated.
She was wild.
She had numerous demons.
But she had a loving heart.
But she had a soft smile.
But her tears smelled like morning dew.
But she was intelligent and worldly.
But she intimidated men.
So, I dove in headfirst without a second thought.
And wow; she was a demon.
The End”

“He is tremendously strong, she thought, and liked the idea, even as she had feared that strength when she first met him”

“Now she had a fumbling knowledge that, had she ever understood Ashley, she would never have loved him; had she ever understood Rhett, she would never have lost him.”