“All the colours in the rainbow don't compare, With one look in your impossible eyes, And I walked into the trap with my eyes wide shut, But I never knew what it would be like. All the plans were made, In the wooded glade, Where your body was split wide open, And I count to ten, As the race begins, Round your hairpin bends. Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Without you to hold me. I can't count the times I forgot my lines, And you pretended that you didn't know, Let me take you through each stage of the male mistake, And we'll adopt our natural roles. And I need you more, Than you need to be needed, So I sign my will one stab at a time, And I count to ten, As the race begins, Round your hairpin bends. Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Without you to hold me. Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Without you to hold me. Away, away, away, away ".”

“All the colours in the rainbow don't compare, With one look in your impossible eyes, And I walked into the trap with my eyes wide shut, But I never knew what it would be like. All the plans were made, In the wooded glade, Where your body was split wide open, And I count to ten, As the race begins, Round your hairpin bends. Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Without you to hold me. I can't count the times I forgot my lines, And you pretended that you didn't know, Let me take you through each stage of the male mistake, And we'll adopt our natural roles. And I need you more, Than you need to be needed, So I sign my will one stab at a time, And I count to ten, As the race begins, Round your hairpin bends. Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Without you to hold me. Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Sometimes I feel I'll float away, Without you to hold me. Away, away, away, away ".”

“Romance is the literature of hope.”

“Love hurts.Think back over romance novels you’ve loved or the genre-defining books that drive our industry. The most unforgettable stories and characters spring from crushing opposition. What we remember about romance novels is the darkness that drives them. Three hundred pages of folks being happy together makes for a hefty sleeping pill, but three hundred pages of a couple finding a way to be happy in the face of impossible odds makes our hearts soar. In darkness, we are all alone.So don’t just make love, make anguish for your characters. As you structure a story, don’t satisfy your hero’s desires, thwart them. Make sure your solutions create new problems. Nurture your characters doubts and despair. Make them earn the happy ending they want, even better…make them deserve it. Delay and disappointment charge situations and validate character growth. Misery accompanies love. It’s no accident that many of the stories we think of as timeless romances in Western Literature are fiercely tragic: Romeo and Juliet, Tristan and Isolde, Cupid and Psyche… the pain in them drags us back again and again, hoping that this time we’ll find a way out of the dark.Only if you let your characters get lost will we get lost in them. And that, more than anything else, is what romance can and should do for its protagonists and its readers: lead us through the labyrinth, skirt the monstrous despair roaming its halls, and find our way into daylight.”

“I have a black pair of suede Jimmy Choos. I've only worn them once to a Sony event. The heels have these arrow plates in a pattern. There's gold, black and white and they're amazing!”

“Sometimes she wore Levi's with white-suede fringe sewn down the legs and a feathered Indian headdress, sometimes old fifties' taffeta dresses covered with poetry written in glitter, or dresses made of kids' sheets printed with pink piglets or Disney characters.”

“Christmas Eve, 1955, Benny Profane, wearing black levis, suede jacket, sneakers and big cowboy hat, happened to pass through Norfolk, Virginia. Given to sentimental impulses, he thought he'd look in on the Sailor's Grave, his old tin can's tavern on East Main Street.”

“They took they hit the cobblestone streets to look at churches, with Isabella wearing suede Manolos. "She's breaking her legs and I tell her it's just ridiculous and that she had to get some proper shoes." She bought and put on a pair of espadrilles and promptly broke into tears. "I can't. I can't. Everytime I look down on my feet I feel so depressed." Roberts said, "Well, are you going to be depressed or are you going to have a broken ankle?" "I am going to have a broken ankle" she said and she threw the shoes away.”

“Pulling through is what people do around here. There is a kind of bravery in their lives that isn’t bravery at all. It is automatic, unflinching, a mix of man and machine, consuming and unquestionable obligation meeting illness move for move in a giant even-steven game of chess – an unending round of something that looks like shadowboxing, though between love and death, which is the shadow? “Everyone admires us for our courage,” says one man. “They have no idea what they’re talking about.”“Courage requires options,” the man adds.“There are options,” says a woman with a thick suede headband. “You could give up. You could fall apart.”“No you can’t. Nobody does. I’ve never seen it,” says the man. “Well, not really fall apart.”

“Pop culture. Nobody does bullshit better than us. Right? China took over manufacturing. And the Middle East has us on fossil fuels. That's just geography and politics. We're a nation of whacko immigrants. Scavengers and con men. We crossed the ocean on faith, stole some land and stone-cold made up a whole country out of nothing but balls and bullshit. Superhero comics got invented by crazy genius Jews who showed up and revamped the refugee experience into a Man of Steel sent from Krypton with a secret identity.”

“Bravery usually looked stupid from the outside.”