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81 " I always thought the girl in that picture had the look of a frog about her,” Nancy said, thinking, I look enigmatic because I’m dying. “Isn’t "
― Kate Atkinson , A God in Ruins (Todd Family, #2)
82 " Sometimes it takes just one good man, Ursula said to him during the war. Neither of them could think of an example from history, “except the Buddha perhaps,” Ursula offered. “I’m not convinced by the reality of Christ.” There were plenty of instances where it had taken just one bad man, Teddy said gloomily. "
83 " Secrets had the power to kill a marriage "
84 " Sometimes it takes just one good man "
85 " Teddy thought of his wife and his sister as two sides of the same shining coin. Nancy was an idealist, Ursula a realist; Nancy an optimist with a lively heart, while Ursula’s spirit was freighted with the grief of history. Ursula was forever cast out of Eden and making the best of it while Nancy, cheerful and undaunted, was sure her search for the gate back into the garden would be successful. "
86 " Much good may "honour" do them when they're dead "
87 " (‘The mistake,’ Sylvie said, ‘is thinking that love equates with happiness.’) "
88 " But appearance and reality were different things, weren't they? "
89 " The triumph of the human spirit,” the new nursing sister said, new enough to talk about “positive outcomes” and “enhancement programmes”—emollient management-speak, meaningless to most of the residents of Poplar Hill, who were either dying or demented or both. It was called a “care home” but there was precious little of either to be had when you were run by a profit-based health-care provider employing minimum-wage staff. "
90 " The Germans were victims of the Nazis too, but one can’t say that too loudly, of course. "
91 " Sacrifice,’ ” he remembered Sylvie saying, “is a word that makes people feel noble about slaughter.” “These "
92 " Untouched by morning and untouched by noon, sleep the meek members of the Resurrection, rafter of satin and roof of stone.’ Emily Dickinson. "
93 " Discretion being the better part of valour, "
94 " He didn’t make plans himself any more. There was now and it was followed by another now. If you were lucky. "
95 " They had been too taken up with each other, grasshoppers enjoying the summer, rather than ants preparing for the winter. "
96 " The dead were legion and the gods had their own secret agenda. "
97 " Some might count sheep. Teddy counted the towns and cities he had tried to destroy, that had tried to destroy him. Perhaps they had succeeded. "
98 " bluestocking, Nancy. Married life has quite changed something "
99 " That was the moment at which he realized that he had possibly become unhinged. What did it matter? The whole world was unhinged. "
100 " now Viola could see the value of sounding chirpy even when you didn’t feel like it. You were more likely to get what you wanted, for one thing. "