“Save when you don’t need it, and it’ll be there for you when you do.”

“I'm sitting up in the bed with my knees pulled to my chest and there are tears that won't come to my eyes but beat instead like a small sea around my heart.”

“All spiritual leaders who live in luxury cannot enter God's Paradise in Heaven. Repent or Perish.”

“The darkness in me could not stand the light any longer. It wanted to escape, vanish without a trace to a place where it could not be seen. But I could not let it happen; I could not let it run, I’m giving it no choice. It was going to ride itself out and face the truth it doesn’t want to know. It was to face itself in the mirror of hope, of despair. I gave the darkness no choice. It was to turn back into the light.”

“I want to be able to do anything with words: handle slashing, flaming descriptions like Wells, and use the paradox with the clarity of Samuel Butler, the breadth of Bernard Shaw and the wit of Oscar Wilde, I want to do the wide sultry heavens of Conrad, the rolled-gold sundowns and crazy-quilt skies of Hitchens and Kipling as well as the pastel dawns and twilights of Chesterton. All that is by way of example. As a matter of fact I am a professed literary thief, hot after the best methods of every writer in my generation.”

“There's no grand plan and no one's in charge. It's all just fumbling about in the dark, and half the time you're not even sure why you're fumbling. You're so desperate for something to pin your peace of mind to that you'll do all sorts of stupid things in its name. You don't mean to break up a marriage, but if breaking it up might let you sleep like a normal person again, suddenly you start considering it. You don't mean to become a drunk, but if drink is the only way you can keep a handle on some tiny compartment of your life then it's straight for the bottle.”

“It's always hard when you've known a person a long time and then you have to recognise that you have nothing left in common but your memories.”

“That is what you love a friend for: the ability to change your angle of vision, bring back your best self when you feel worst. And speak the truth -- but without malice. Loving candour is the secret of friendship.”