“Hope is made of air, and wishes. An empty box wrapped in shiny paper.And now Dad wants me to be the ambassador of hope for his foundation. How can I be the ambassador of hope, when hope doesn't change anything? When unrealized hopes only bring pain and despair?”

“Hope is made of air, and wishes. An empty box wrapped in shiny paper.And now Dad wants me to be the ambassador of hope for his foundation. How can I be the ambassador of hope, when hope doesn't change anything? When unrealized hopes only bring pain and despair?”

“The only thing that gave me comfort in the attic was thinking about my family. Now I'm home, but it's not the home I imagined. Not the family I imagined. I'd convinced myself that they'd continued on with their happy, carefree lives without me, that they were doing it double, because I couldn't do it at all. I was wrong.”

“Each second of my four years, two months, and seven days in the attic dragged on forever, and nothing ever changed. But outside the attic, everything changed, and so violently fast. Destruction and devastation for all of us, whether we were in the attic or out.”

“I say to my sister, "I thought you were doing the things in our Dream Book. I was sure of it." "Why would I do that stuff without you?" "Because you could.""Well, you were wrong.”

“My sister has never not told me something before. We used to share every secret, every thought. While I was in the attic, it felt like we were forever far away. Now I'm with her again. We're so close that we're touching, but there's still a distance between us.”

“Do it double, because some can't do it at all.”

“My Keeper's house. Right there. Brown shingles, dark red shutters, yellow-and-black police tape wrapped around the massive tree trunks. The attic window looks out over the yard and the world narrows until that attic window is the only thing I can see.”

“So many cameras are on me. This press conference is going to be on every news channel and posted on the internet. Thousands, maybe millions of people will see me. And they will all be thinking: Victim. Victim. Victim.”

“My Keeper took everything from me: my home, my family, my voice. He made me powerless. But I'm home now. It may be split in two, but I have it back. My family may be broken, but I have it back. I have my voice back. I am not powerless anymore.”

“Some stories won't have a happy ending, but there's always hope that the next one will. Hope is everything. Even when there's nothing else. Especially when there's nothing else.”

“My father is using me as a message of hope. My sister is using me as a message of fear.I don't want to be used by anybody.”