“Tessa is gone, and every moment she is gone is a knife ripping me apart from the inside.”

“She carried a knife inside of herself now, one that was always cutting her. She could feel it every time she swallowed, every time her thoughts strayed from the splendor of the wild.”

“Inside and out, Westley's world was ripping apart and he could do nothing but crack along with it.”

“Somebody sees me, and I see myself through them. Then it’s all gone, the whole world falls apart.”

“From the beginning…you (the ALA) have welcomed and supported me. Tonight you have gone one step further—you have adopted me.” She later explained, “It was at that moment, and ever after, that I regarded myself as a librarian.”

“Holding onto something that's gone only makes a sickness inside.”

“I didn't believe in it for a moment
but I gulped down the wine of my own voice.
And then I wrestled with the darkness inside me,
knocked it down, clawed at it, ripped it to shreds.”

“I began to feel that all the people I'd ever known who had died or left me had not in fact gone away, but continued to live on inside me just as this man's wife lived on inside him.”

“For a moment hope, bright and cruel as a knife, presented itself to me. It took every ounce of strength I had to turn away.”

“For this moment, nothing matters. Look up into the stars and you're gone.”