P.D. James, The Lighthouse

"Unnatural death always provoked a peculiar unease, an uncomfortable realization that there were still some things that might not be susceptible to bureaucratic control."

"I wonder if childhood is ever really happy. Just as well, perhaps. To be blissfully happy so young would leave one always seeking to recapture the unobtainable. Like those people who were always happiest at school or university. Always going back. No reunion ever missed. It always seemed to me rather pathetic."

"Every island to a child is a treasure island."

"Our parents' generation carried the past memorialized in paint, porcelain, and wood; we cast it off. Even our national history is remembered in terms of the worst we did, not the best."

"Not so much two ships passing in the night as two ships sailing together for a time but always bound for different ports."