9/11 forced us to build another identity, to look deep and say who are we, and what do we believe and is killing in the name of Islam part of that religion? No. No. No.

— Ruth Ahmed

As the days dwindled towards the end of the week I knew only one thing: I couldn't return to our old life. Maroon had taken Honor and Al with him,

— Ruth Ahmed

Do you ever look up at the stars and try to contemplate the ends of the universe?

— Ruth Ahmed

Do you have a girlfriend?'' No,' I said quickly. Deny Honor again. Peter only denied Jesus three times. I must have denied Honor like three thousand times.

— Ruth Ahmed

Five words that were the hardest words I would ever have to say, Five pillars of my faith that couldn't save him that day. Five rivers, the Pan AAB, that didn't flow through his veins. Five minutes that changed our world forever.

— Ruth Ahmed

Her English was sweet, an effort for her, anachronistic and unpractised.

— Ruth Ahmed

Her voice was erudite, interesting; the voice of someone who straddled two cultures with a surety and style that I wished my boyfriend could find. She was smart, funny, and, above all, completely capable of controlling her life and what happened to it.

— Ruth Ahmed

Honor and I would have to create our world, live by our own rules. My family wasn't ready for her just yet. I didn't know if they ever would be.

— Ruth Ahmed

Honor, in her modern self-confidence, had grown up never having to face actual raw, passionate, drop-down-dead-hostility. She didn't really understand what was going to happen,

— Ruth Ahmed

Honor looked so much like a child herself, confined to bed, a white nightgown, like one of those maudlin Victorian dolls. Her cheeks were red, like someone had painted them, but I knew it was from rubbing, wiping away her melancholy.

— Ruth Ahmed