Sarah Winman

“Their banter was rich and comfortable, their teasing intimate and profound; their 'I love you' without the use of those startling words.”

“Nothing stays forgotten for long, Elly. Sometimes we simply have to remind the world that we're special and that we're still here.”

“I'd been feeling like this for a while, the continual looking back, the stuckness of it all. I blamed it on the coming New Year, only four and a half months away, when the clocks would read zero and we would start again, could start again, but I knew we wouldn't. Nothing would. The world would be the same, just a little bit worse.”

“This had always been the worst time when the quiet emptiness could leave him gasping for breath. She was there, his wife, a peripheral shadow moving across a doorway, or in the reflection of a window, and he had to stop looking for her. And the whiskey helped – helped him walk past her when the fire was doused. But occasionally she followed him up the stairs and that’s why he began to take the bottle with him, because she stood in the corner of their bedroom and watched him undress, and when he was on the verge of sleep, she leant over him and asked him things like, Remember when we first met?”

“And I wonder what the sound of a heart breaking might be. And I think it might be quiet, unperceptively so, and not dramatic at all. Like the sound of an exhausted swallow falling gently to earth.”

“Nothing stays forgotten for long, Elly. Sometimes we simply have to remind the world that we're still here.”

“The choir sang and the old man sang and Drake couldn't sing, and suddenly he began to cry because of the music, because of the sound of the boys' voices, because of what they might turn into.”

“You said I could be anything I wanted when I was older', I said.She smiled and said, 'And you can be. But it's not very easy to become Jewish.''I know,' I said forlornly, 'I need a number.'And she suddenly stopped smiling.”

“Those left behind prayed constantly for peace but prayers came back with Return to Sender stamped all over them. Only the roll call of the dead grew.”

“Shut up, Arthur,' said my mother, and he zipped his mouth shut like an infuriating child.Ginger started to laugh. Not at anything in particular, but just because Ginger was stoned.”

“And they held on tight to that beautiful silent moment before words transported them to the realm of the ordinary, to the realm of the inarticulate and mundane.”

“The principles of catching rumours were, in fact, similar to the principals of catching dreams, but because rumour was weightier, the catcher had to be positioned closer to the ground. Rumour flew low, dreams flew high, and somewhere in between were prayers.”

“Emotions embarassed her except when she sang. My dad said that was exactly why she sang.”

“I walked out and breathed fresh air. I felt the sun on my skin. The world is a different place when you are well, when you are young. The world is beautiful and safe. I said hello to the gatekeeper. He said hello back to me.”