132 Quotes by Elizabeth McCracken

All I can say is, it's a sort of kinship, as though there is a family tree of grief. On this branch, the lost children, on this the suicided parents, here the beloved mentally ill siblings. When something terrible happens, you discover all of the sudden that you have a new set of relatives, people with whom you can speak in the shorthand of cousins.

Despite popular theories, I believe people fall in love based not on good looks or fate but on knowledge. Either they are amazed by something a beloved knows that they themselves do not know; or they discover a common rare knowledge; or they can supply knowledge to someone who's lacking. Hasn't everyone found a strange ignorance in someone beguiling? . . .Nowadays, trendy librarians, wanting to be important, say, Knowledge is power. I know better. Knowledge is love.

I'm a princess and sometimes I'm a fairy, and I'm a mermaid too.' I thought she was marvellous. She knew her own worth, she insisted on it. She knew that no matter how miserable the circumstances in which life placed her, she was better than that. She knew that a part of her was special and remarkable, and she was able to articulate that in her own way.

I’m so sorry,” he said, because after Pamela died, he promised himself that if anyone told him the smallest, saddest story, he would answer, I’m so sorry. Meaning, Yes, that happened. You couldn't believe the people who believed that not mentioning sadness was a kind of magic that could stave off the very sadness you didn't mention – as though grief were the opposite of Rumpelstiltskin and materialized only at the sound of its own name.

Like all good mothers, she always knew the worst was going to happen and was disappointed and relieved when it finally did.

Movie kisses looked like they'd hurt. She couldn't get enough of them. They made her feel alive - not in any expansive way, but assessed, her pulse taken, a rubber mallet to the knee that made her kick.

Grief lasts longer than sympathy, which is one of the tragedies of the grieving.

They found a body in the Salford cemetery, but aboveground and alive.

Do not trust an architect: he will always try to talk you into an atrium.