"'Maybe we should go by tube', he said.

'A taxi'll come', she said. 'I'm in no hurry'.

She remembered something a woman in Paris had told her once. A woman in her forties, much married, elegant, a little world-weary. There is nothing easier in this world, this woman had claimed, than getting a man to kiss you. Oh really? Eva had said, so how do you do that? Just stand close to a man, the woman has said, very close, as close as you can without touching - he will kiss you in one minute or two. It's inevitable. For them it's like an instinct - they can't resist. Infaillible.

So Eva stood close to Romer in the doorway of the shop on Frith Street as he shooted and waved at the passing cars moving down the dark street, hoping one of them might be a taxi.

'We're out of luck', he said, turning, to find Eva standing very close to him, her face lifted.

'I'm in no hurry', she said.

He reached for her and kissed her."
— William Boyd (Restless)

"I stood there in the kitchen, watching her staring across the meadow still searching for her nemesis and I thought, suddenly, that this is all our lives - this is the one fact that applies to us all, that makes us what we are, our common mortality, our common humanity. One day someone is going to come and take us away: you don't need to have been a spy, I thought, to feel like this."
— William Boyd (Restless)

"I have teken refuge in the doctrine that advises one not to seek tranquility in certainty but in permanently suspended judgement.

From Brazzaville Beach"
— William Boyd

"In definitiva l'esistenza è solo il totale di tutta la buona e la cattiva sorte che accumuli. Questa semplice formuletta spiega tutto. Fa' il consuntivo. Confronta le colonne della fortuna e della sfortuna, e il rispettivo ammontare. Non puoi farci niente: non c'è nessuno che le spartisca, che le distribuisca a questo o a quello: capita, tutto qua. Dobbiamo sopportare quietamente le leggi della condizione umana, come dice Montaigne."
— William Boyd (Any Human Heart)

"E' incredibile la rapidità dell'effetto - dev'essere il risultato di un'atavica, profonda spinta all'accoppiamento sepolta dentro di noi. Un'occhiata e pensi: "Sì, è lei, questa va bene per me". E' come se tutte le parti istintuali del tuo corpo si mettessero a cantare all'unisono. Quali fattori si combinano per produrre questa sensazione? La curvatura di un sopracciglio? Il turgore di un labbro? La flessuosità di una caviglia? L'esilità di un polso?..."
— William Boyd (Any Human Heart)