120 Quotes by Karen Thompson Walker

Sometimes I think I might not have written ‘The Age of Miracles’ if I hadn’t grown up in California, if I hadn’t been exposed to its very particular blend of beauty and disaster, of danger and denial.

When one’s life seems broken beyond repair, there remains one last move: a person can at least shut her eyes.

Who are we to say that they are not right now dreaming a better world?

I left my job in the fall, and now I can set my life up around writing instead of squeezing writing into my day; it’s amazing to have that time, and I feel very lucky.

I like to edit my sentences as I write them. I rearrange a sentence many times before moving on to the next one. For me, that editing process feels like a form of play, like a puzzle that needs solving, and it’s one of the most satisfying parts of writing.

How much sweeter life would be if it all happened in reverse, if, after decades of disappointments, you finally arrived at an age when you had conceded nothing, when everything was possible. I like to think about how my parents’ lives once shimmered in front of them, half hidden, like buried gold.

This is how the sickness travels best: through all the same channels as do fondness and friendship and love.

The mother seems relieved to have heard that this affliction might be psychological, as if the failings of the mind are any less destructive than those of the body.

As an editor, I read Charlotte Rogan’s amazing debut novel, ‘The Lifeboat,’ when it was still in manuscript. I read it in one night, and I really wanted my company to publish it, but we lost it to another house. It’s such a wonderful combination of beautiful writing and suspenseful storytelling.