“Everywhere you look it unpacks to infinity. What you look for, you find. And you people can have it. All of… — M. John Harrison

Generally, it was impossible to understand the motives of aliens.

People think it’s a failure to live alone. But it isn’t. The failure is to live with someone because you can’t face anything else.

She had impressed him as capable of behaviour even more meaningless than most human beings. He had watched her kill her own people with a ferocity that betrayed real grief. But she was someone, he had decided early, who struggled harder with life than she needed to: this he respected, even admired.