Quotes from Paula McLain, The Paris Wife

He was a humorist, and everyone knew the funny writers were the most serious sort under their skins.

We called Paris the great good place then, and it was. We invented it after all. We made it with our longing and cigarettes and Rhum St. James; we made it with smoke and smart and savage conversation and we dared anyone to say it wasn't ours. Together we made everything and then we busted it apart again.

We were surrounded by people on the platform, but we were entirely alone.

The way we're happening to each other?

I want to write one true sentence, he said. If I can write one sentence, simple and true, every day, I'll be satisfied.