Maureen Johnson

“The kids I talk to are readers, and the craziest, the most dedicated readers you will ever see.”

“People were freaked out, but they showed it in weird ways. Back home, people would have been weeping and doing a lot of very public group hugs. At Wexford people just aggressively pretended nothing had happened.”

“When she emerged, Keith was watching the tiny round window of the under-the-counter washing machine. "Put your clothes in for a wash," he said. "They were disgusting."Ginny always thought that the only way of getting clothes clean was by drowning them in scalding water and then whipping them around in a violent centrifugal motion that caused the entire washing machine to vibrate and the floor to shake. You beat them clean. You made them suffer. This machine used about half a cup of water and was about as violent as a toaster, plus it stopped every few minutes, as if it were exhausted from the effort of turning itself.Sluff, sluff, sluff sluff. Rest. Rest. Rest.Click.Sluff, sluff, sluff, sluff. Rest. Rest. Rest."Who thought to put a window on a washing machine?" Keith asked. "Does anyone just sit and watch their wash?"You mean, besides us?""Well," he said, "yeah. Is there any coffee?”

“It was as if the news itself wanted to reassure me. Even Jack the Ripper himself had reappeared as part of the greeting committee.”

“You can't curl up on the sofa and deny life forever. Life is always going to be a series of ouch-making moments, and the question was, was I going to go all fetal-position or was I going to woman up?”

“Every time you try to flirt with her, a puppy dies.”

“I’d love to be a tabletop in Paris, where food is art and life combined in one, where people gather and talk for hours. I want lovers to meet over me. I’d want to be covered in drops of candle wax and breadcrumbs and rings from the bottom of wineglasses. I would never be lonely, and I would always serve a good purpose.”

“Maybe this was what Aunt Peg meant all along - returning was a weird thing. You can never visit the same place twice. Each time, it's a different story. By the very act of coming back, you wipe our what came before.”

“I read two mysteries a day when I was a kid. All of Agatha Christie, all of 'Sherlock Holmes.' I've seen every single British detective show ever made.”

“My final word: don't follow your dreams . . . chase them. With a stick, or a shovel, or whatever you have handy. Get that [bleep]ing dream!”

“My rule is: the second you find yourself doing something you hate, quit doing it.”

“I've heard people on panels say, 'You must have a Web site. You need to tweet. Repeat the title of your book constantly,' and I just want to say, 'Shut up. Everything you're saying is wrong.' People will know instantly if your only motivation for tweeting is to sell books.”

“WORTH IT and perfect are different things. No one’s perfect, yet in romance, everyone becomes WORTH IT. And that’s the trick.”

“I decided to deflect her attitude by giving a long, Southern answer. I come from people who know how to draw things out. Annoy a Southerner, and we will drain away the moments of your life with our slow, detailed replies until you are nothing but a husk of your former self and that much closer to death.”

“It just seemed like telling the truth would mean admitting some weakness”

“I looked at the stained-glass image of the lamb in the window above me, but that only reminded me that lambs are famous for being led to slaughter, or sometimes hanging out with lions in ill-advised relationships.”

“Fear can't hurt you. When it washes over you, give it no power. it's a snake with no venom.”

“She had always thought applying to college would be exciting. Living away from home, meeting so many new people, Learning new things, making a few poor life desicisons....”

“Hey! Jack the Wanker! Over here! I want your autograph!”

“Money is for doing things, my love. Don't sit on it like a hen sits on an egg. It doesn't hatch. I should know. I've made enough of it.”