The Silkworm

‘Why do people do this?’
‘Blog, you mean? I don’t know… didn’t someone once say the unexamined life isn’t worth living?’
‘Yeah, Plato,’ said Strike, ‘but this isn’t examining a life, it’s exhibiting it.’

through thick and thin

Twenty-six years of empty evenings, you could have written plenty of books by now, with your first from Oxford… but what would you write about? You haven’t exactly lived a full life, have you?’

the safest way of ensuring that secret information did not leak was not to tell anybody about it

Why did she have to have been presented with such a choice, today of all days?

‘She couldn’t understand a vocation. Some people can’t; at best, work’s about status and pay cheques for them, it hasn’t got value in itself.’

… as an earnest of friendship and confidence, I’ll acquaint you with a design that I have. To tell truth, and speak openly one to another…

William Congreve, Love for Love

Everything was pared down to the essential when you were in this degree of pain.

Running away was her life’s blood and he had been her favourite destination, freedom and safety combined

for it had always been understood that he should stand rock-like, to be left and returned to, never flinching, never giving up