A Map for the Missing Quotes

“It meant that if you could define what was absent, create a map for the missing, that was also a way of knowing a thing.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“This was the worst part of a death: that the dead could not collect on the balance they were owed, that they left all their burden to the living.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“It wasn't without a pang that the dream ended. The child would always see this place not as their own home, but someone else's.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Hanwen had spent all these days carefully treading around her mother, worried about telling her the truth, when all along her mother had been like a child who just wanted to be told that everything would be all right.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Nothing. It's just that this stable life, with no worries for you, is all I've ever wanted you to have. My job as a mother is done.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Perhaps the country had finished its wars, was done with sending people away without notice and changing in an instant the course of one's life. Or maybe it was not--how would she know?...And so she would keep building this life and her son's, so that they were strong enough to withstand the people around them trying to make history.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“There was a distance between their lives that meant she would never have what he did. What she felt wasn't desire for him, but rather a yearning for his very life.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Did you know that I think of you as a hero? We used to read all those old stories, remember? The hero has a dream, and he goes on a quest for it. He has some obstacles, sure, but in the end, he always makes it. You know the whole time he's going to make it. I remember how nervous we were in those days, studying, but when I think back, I ask myself, why were you nervous? I knew you'd be fine. That wasn't what it was like for me. I had a feeling that I wouldn't make it, and I was right. You got what you wanted, but for me--In the end, I had to find a different way.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Sometimes, her desires seemed so simple that he forgot about her ability to play the fool.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“The unconditional weight of her forgiveness finally seemed more measured, light enough for him to accept.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“There'll be more opportunities for a future. But you have to keep looking for them.' Perhaps that was true, but weren't there other options besides trawling for a husband amongst the diners in this hotel? Would all her books go to waste?”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“It was amazing, he'd thought back then, that an unchanging property of an object wasn't only what was there, but also what wasn't. It meant that if you could define what was absent, create a map for the missing, that was also a way of knowing a thing.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“In fact, he found that, at this time, he cared remarkably little about everyone else. Perhaps he would be called selfish, but that did not concern him now. Disregarding their needs for his brother's was also a form of love.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Even my village--the changes aren't as big there yet, but I had this feeling when I was back there, that everything was on the cusp of being different forever. Like I might accidentally look away and then when I turn back, everything will be gone. But I couldn't tell whether it was the same, or whether it was just me who'd changed.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“There were minuscule differences between the accents of their village and surrounding ones, created and solidified over hundreds of years. Even Baijia Village or Five Groves people didn't sound the same as those from Tang Family Village. How remarkable, Yitian sometimes thought, that now he lived in a country where people couldn't even hear the difference between Chinese and Korean.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Where is forgiveness? How far is it, and how long must I wallk until I reach there?”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“Where is forgiveness? How far is it, and how long must I walk until I reach there?”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing

“She could see more clearly now that some things were not about want, but rather about the sacrifices one had to make to survive in this place, in this time. What her mother had been trying to tell her was that her dreams could no longer hold.”
― Belinda Huijuan Tang, A Map for the Missing