The theme of the dance was "Great Romances," or some such nonsense. There were projections of supposedly great couples from the past on the walls of … - Gabrielle Zevin

How I will miss the horses.

Sometimes things seem so unbearable in the middle of the night, don't they? In the middle of the night, we're all such children.

The words you can't find, you borrow.

We read to know we're not alone. We read because we are alone. We read and we are not alone. We are not alone.

My life is in these books, he wants to tell her. Read these and know my heart.

We are not quite novels.

The analogy he is looking for is almost there.

We are not quite short stories. At this point, his life is seeming closest to that.

In the end, we are collected works.

He has read enough to know there are no collections where each story is perfect. Some hits. Some misses. If you're lucky, a standout. And in the end, people only really remember the standouts anyway, and they don't remember those for very long.

No, not very long.