Quotes from Celeste Ng

Photography, at its heart, was about documentation, and he soon understood that for Mia photography was simply a tool, which she used as a painter might use a brush or a knife.

Moody would never remember crossing the street, or propping his bike in the front walkway, or introducing himself. So it would feel to him that he had always known her name, and that she had always known his, that somehow, he and Pearl had known each other always.

When a long, long time later, he stares down at the silent blue marble of earth and thinks of his sister, as he will at every important moment of his life. He doesn't know this yet, but he senses it deep down in his core. So much will happen, he thinks, that I would want to tell you.

smell of an apple alone, when what you really wanted was to devour it, to sink your teeth into it and consume it, seeds, core, and all.

Tinha a sensação de ter mergulhado em um lago fundo e transparente, e então de ter descoberto que na verdade era uma lagoa rasa, que batia no seu joelho. O que podia fazer? Bem, tinha que se levantar, limpar os joelhos sujos, tirar os pés da lama. E tomar mais cuidado. Ele saberia, dali em diante, que o mundo era um lugar menor do que imaginara.

The Starflex, like all Brownies, allowed no focusing. The shuttle cocked automatically to avoid double exposures—which the manual billed as a convenience for the amateur. All you had to do was all that you could do: peek into the viewfinder and press the shutter.

Was she the bird trying to batter its way free, or was she the care?

It is not too late, he thinks . . . Not yet the end.

Às vezes, quando você acha que tudo está perdido, encontra uma saída. (...) É como um incêndio florestal. (...) Parece o fim do mundo. A terra fica toda queimada e preta, e todo o verde some. Mas, depois de queimar, o solo fica mais rico e coisas novas podem crescer ali. (...) As pessoas também são assim, sabe? Elas recomeçam. Dão um jeito.

Was she the bird trying to batter its way free, or was she the cage?

All her life, she had learned that passion, like fire, was a dangerous thing. It so easily went out of control.

glowering Izzy in the backseat. No one

if the world was on fire, you might as well burn bright.

Do our pasts determine what we deserve in the future? And is it ever possible to leave your past behind?

He can't know what it was like, not the first time, not the last. He can guess, but he won't ever know, not really. What it was like, what she was thinking, everything she'd never told him. Whether she thought he'd failed her, or whether she wanted him to let her go. This, more than anything, makes him feel that she is gone.

Izzy had the heart of a radical, but she had the experience of a fourteen-year-old living in the suburban Midwest.

Mia didn't care, Mrs. Richardson realized, what people thought of her. In a way, this made her dangerous.

Her harebrained live wire of a daughter, the perpetual overreactor, prone to fits of furious indignation about nothing at all.

As he walks, a smattering of memories flare at each step, small bright stones lighting a path through the forest. There is the

They dazzled her, these Richardsons: with their easy confidence, their clear sense of purpose, no matter the time of day.

that she never hung anything because when she wasn't working, she wanted the white space. Palate cleanser, Pauline would explain.

Above her the moon was coin-round, sharp and perfect. Beneath her the boat rocked so gently that she could hardly feel it's motion. Looking up at the sky, she felt as if she were floating in space, completely untethered. She could not believe that anything was impossible.

a completely different kind of woman leading a completely different life, who seemed to make her own rules with no apologies.

What it was like, what she was thinking, everything she'd never told him. Whether she thought he'd failed her, or whether she wanted him to let her go. This, more than anything, makes him feel that she is gone.