Mattie

“We both had books shelved and stacked and boxed and crowding out the furniture. Together, we would never have fitted into either of our apartments. Kevin did suggest once that I get rid of some of my books so that I’d fit into his place. ‘You’re out of your mind!’ I told him. ‘Just some of that book-club stuff that you don’t read.’ We were at my apartment then, so I said, ‘Let’s go to your place and I’ll help you decide which of your books you don’t read. I’ll even help you throw them out.”
― Octavia E. Butler, Kindred

“Late in the afternoon we returned to the First Vestibule. Just before we parted Raphael said, ‘I love the quiet here. No people!’ She said the last part as if it were the greatest advantage of all. ‘Don’t you like the people in your own Halls?’ I asked, puzzled. ‘I like them,’ she said, with no very great enthusiasm. ‘Mostly I like them. Some of them. I don’t always get them. They don’t always get me.”
― Susanna Clarke, Piranesi

“You have never sought to make light of your failings, I do not think you need fear our too harsh condemnation. You have been commonly your own sternest judge.” So he had, but that, well handled, can be one way of evading and forestalling the judgements of others.”
― Ellis Peters, A Morbid Taste for Bones

“You won’t get me to commit myself on that point,’ said Lazenby.”
― Agatha Christie, Towards Zero