“A human life improved by a dog isn’t just a theoretical concept. It’s a real life event that happens a million times a day, all over the world.”

“There’s an old saying about stories, and how there are always three versions of them: yours, mine and the truth. The guy who first said it worked in the film business, but it holds true for journalism too. We’re not really supposed to take sides. We’re supposed to deal in facts: Facts add up to truth.”

“Volterra. The ninth of April, 1478. They put her little brother in a cage. Her brother, who wasn’t so little anymore, but because Ravenna Maffei was older, she would always think of him that way."

“His name was David Winkler and he was fifty-nine years old. This would be his first trip home in twenty-five years - if home was what he could still call it."

It’s hard to find a truly funny book ...but this is one. If you love books, trivia contests and witty repartee, then you must read The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman.

In 2001, Geraldine Brooks, one of my favorite authors, published her first novel Year of Wonders. She wrote it after coming across an intriguing finger post in England pointing to the Plague Village.

If you’re looking for a well written, World War II story, more fact than fiction, that illustrates the power of human goodness, then you must read The Ragged Edge of Night by Olivia Hawker.

If you’re looking for a book that sheds light on the amazing work the British code breakers accomplished shortening WWII by two years, then you must read The Rose Code by Kate Quinn.

If you’re interested in the history of flight or love McCullough’s writings, then you must read The Wright Brothers by David McCulllough.

"Any multinational organization can be cutthroat, but when the organization is made up of trained killers, the stakes are incalculably high."

“There is a place, hidden among the sweeping sandy swaths of southern desert, where all you can see is red. From above, it’s a carpet of crimson, but as you lean closer, you see that it’s not one singular sheet of color, but rows upon rows of distinct red dots. Like a wild field of poppies. Except it’s nothing like that."

“Sometimes, in her sleepless hours, she watches the strips of moonlight slide across her bedroom ceiling, glances at that photograph, and thinks wistfully about the family she could have had, all the pictures of holidays that will never exist...."

“Salento, Italy, June 1934: A coach stops in the main square of Lizzanello, a tight-knit village where everyone knows one another. A couple gets off: the man, Carlo, is happy to be back home after a long time away; the woman, Anna - his wife - is a stranger from the North. Carlo’s brother is there to meet them, and he and everyone else can’t help but notice that Anna is as beautiful as a Greek statue.”

“Strange people often came to the farm, but they tended to be late risers, so Mad knew the first few hours would be easy…Now she looked up to see a car driving down the dirt road, a PT Cruiser, which was not a car that you saw in this area."

“It’s one of the last days before Easter. Very soon Louisa is going to be thrown out of an art auction for vandalizing a valuable painting. Old ladies will shriek and the police will come and it really wasn’t planned.”