"The reality is that many of us in these parts are not enamored of Paris.' The Commandant gulped down his coffee. 'I worked there as a young officer in the CRS, the riot squad. I speak from personal experience. Paris is bizarre. Paris is a museum surrounded by a jungle."

"I didn’t have to look at him to know I’d just lost everything I’d ever wanted because I felt it. I felt the loss seep into bone and tissue. I felt it settle between the cracks in my heart and the empty holes in my soul."

"All the same I fear what happens when we expand the terrain of medical practice to include actively assisting people with speeding their death. I am less worried about the abuse of these powers than I am about dependence on them."

"[T]he normal and the everyday are often amazingly unstoppable, and what is unimaginable is the cessation of them. The world is resilient, and, no matter what interruptions occur, people so badly want to return to their lives and get on with them. A veneer of civilization descends quickly, like a shining rain. Dust is settled."