I Knew You'd Be Lovely by: Alethea Black

This is a book that was assigned to me by my book club months ago and I finally was able to catch up on some reading and get around to it. It is a part of Oprah Winfrey's book club list and is described by amazon as a "...deeply moving and wholly original debut features a coterie of memorable characters who have reached emotional crossroads in their lives. Brimming with humor, irony, and insights about the unpredictable nature of life, the unbearable beauty of fate, and the power that one moment, or one decision, can have to transform us, I Knew You'd Be Lovely delivers that rare thing—stories with both an edge and a heart." 

In my words, it is a collection of short stories about people's lives that are fragmented and leaves you sort of uncomfortable because you have not been given an ending, there is no closure! In each of these stories clearly the main characters are at a point in their lives where something has got to change... the end of each story is when they really take action with this; however, we never know how it turns out. Which sort of irritates me, personally, although I also kind of liked it. Each story left me with this hopeful feeling that the possibilities are endless and that their lives belonged to them and aren't just simply for me to read and know everything about. 

Quotes:

"Love never repeats."

"Best of all, it made him feel as if the unspoken in him were connecting with the unspoken in her, and it crossed his mind that this was all chemistry ever was: two people's silent selves invisibly aligning while their noisy selves carried on, oblivious."

"Perfection isn't outside us. Perfection is a way of seeing."

"And I'm no good at being in love, either," she said abruptly, shifting away from him. She sometimes had a talent for dispelling awkward moments by making them even more awkward. "I don't lie the idea of giving yourself up, of surrendering. Why does it have to be like that? Who invented this system, anyway?"

"Sometimes you can miss something even when you know it's not for you anymore."

"We're all allowed a kind of grace period, she decided, when we can coast along, before we really need to choose a life and summon the determination to live it."

"She always liked the idea of savings, even if she wasn't particularly keen on its practice. She liked calling it savings, too, because it was like that: You think you're saving something, when actually, it saves you."

"When you are sorrowful look again in our heart, and you shall see that you are weeping for that which has been your delight."

"Wanting things too much is a form of sadness."

"Often it is not even advantageous to know what will be. -Cicero"

"Failure is not the enemy," he said. "Even the wrong choice can lead you in the right direction."

"When dreams come true, they often don't look like you though they would. Be prepared for that."

"What occurrence is the most standard deviations away from your normal range of experience? he said."

"My mother claims that people show you everything you need to know about them within the first hour of meeting them, it's just that most of us aren't paying attention."