A Thousand Splendid Suns

"Better to get down on your knees and pray."

"I have told myself to stop asking why and just to accept that this is my life."

"Children aren't coloring books. You don't get to fill them with your favorite colors."

"It's a father's duty to feel angered by his daughter's presence."

"Love and loyalty, that is all that matters."

"Life has a way of working these things out."

"Better to get hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie."

"There is something I must do."

"Forgiveness is not something you earn through suffering."

"I am tired of being a prisoner in this house."

"There is no point in dwelling on the past."

"A man's home is his castle."

"You'll see, Mariam. It won't always be this way."

"Women like us. We endure."

"I am the house. The walls, the roof, the doors, the windows."

"She would die here if she had to."

"Love and marriage are not always the same thing."

"Forgiveness is not something learned in a day."

"We endure. It is the only thing to do."

"It's a special kind of love, the love for a place."

"Suffering is a long journey through a long tunnel."

"When you love someone, you do not sit around wishing you could be classier, or pretty."

"It always hurts more to have and lose than to not have in the first place."

"There is dignity in work."

"You will bear this patiently."

"I will have to be clever about this."

"There is no need for blood."

"You will never leave this house, Miriam. Do you understand?"

"A bond between women is stronger than steel."

"There is dignity in standing alone."