Quotes from Jodi Picoult, Handle with Care

A sacrament--like marriage--means living a life better than your natural instincts, so that you're modeling God. And God never gives up.

What you didn't tell someone was just as debilitating as what you did.

It felt like I'd been living underground, and for a moment, I'd been given this glimpse of the sky. Once you've seen that, how can you go back where you came from?

I drew it over my skin like a violins bow, No one would ever hear the song of my shame.

It never failed to amaze me how the most ordinary day could be catapulted into the extraordinary in the blink of an eye.

Being a parent wasn't just about bearing a child. It was about bearing witness to its life.

I don't know whether you can look at your past and find, woven like the hidden symbols on a treasure map, the path that will point to your final destination.

[I] don't think I was trying to kill myself. I just wanted to hurt, and understand exactly whay I was hurting. This made sense: you cut, you felt pain, period.

When you love someone, you say their name different. Like it's safe inside your mouth.

All any of us wanted, really, was to know that we counted. That someone else's life would not have been as rich without us here.

It was one thing to sacrifice your own life for someone else's. It was another thing entirely to bring into the mix a third party - a third party who knew you, who trusted you implicitly.

What we all want, really, is to be loved. That craving drives our worst behavior.

Things that look impossible suddenly seem a lot better, once you get God on board.

No, honestly, my mouth shouldn't be able to function unless my brain's engaged.

When you showed someone how you felt, it was fresh and honest. When you told someone how you felt, there might be nothing behind the words but habit or expectation.

I don't understand why it's a sin if you love something and want to keep it from having to suffer.

I could not remember my first kiss, but I could have told you Charlotte would be my last.

But memory is like plaster: peel it back and you just might find a completely different picture.

Maybe that's what we do to the people we love: take shots in the dark and realize too late that we've wounded the people we are trying to protect.

You don't have to say I love you to say I love you.

When you love someone - when you create a child with him - you don't just suddenly lose that bond. Like any other energy, it can't be destroyed, just channeled into something else.

So much of marriage was implicit and nonverbal. Had I gotten so complacent I'd forgotten to communicate?

I would prove to you that being different isn't a death sentence but a call to arms.

Although you hadn't asked why, it had less to do with you not noticing than with you not wanting to hear the answer.