William Shakespeare is arguably the greatest writer of all time. He has a mediocre 3.7 average on Goodreads.

Erwin Schrödinger . . .’ ‘He of the cat.

And I walked across the gravel, towards the road and somewhere in the universe of my soul a fiery, life-giving star collapsed, and a very black hole began to form.

But since when did taste have anything to do with happiness?

Back in Mother Ivy’s time I would have been obliged to cook you gingerbread and show you my spickle dancing, and yet now I have permission to chop you up into little pieces. I cry myself to sleep every night, and feel dead inside, but society is definitely improving.

I'm sorry," I say. "About being a bit odd sometimes, at school." Camille shakes her head. "You really have to stop saying that. Incessant apologizing is never an attractive trait." "You're right. The thing is, I really am quite bad, you know, with people." "Ah, them. People. Yes, it's hard." "And I have a lot, sometimes, going on in my head." "Join the club." "There's a club?" "No. There are too many people in clubs. But it's fine. Be how you want to be.

Human history is full of depressing things like colonization, disease, racism, sexism...inventions of things which they had no idea how to handle (the atomic bomb, the Internet, the semicolon)....And through it all there has always been some truly awful food.