THE MUSEUM AND THE NOVEL TOGETHER

"Because the press used the same device in photographs of adulteresses, rape victims, and prostitutes, there were so many photographs of women with black bands over their eyes that to read a Turkish newspaper in those days was like wandering through a masquerade."

"I have here the clock, and these matchsticks and matchbooks, because the display suggests how I spent the slow ten or fifteen minutes it took me to accept that Füsun was not coming that day."

"I slipped that into my pocket, along with a large mica marble and a few hairpins that I had no doubt were hers."

"...and there at the wheel we would see the mustached captain with his cap; so close that he could see the crackling mackerel at our table, and the eggplant purée and fritters, the white cheese, the melon and rakı, he would cry, “Good appetite”."

"For a week, I had been aware that in the ashtray now resting there was the butt of a cigarette Füsun had stubbed out. At one moment I picked it up, breathing in its scent of smoke and ash, and
placing it between my lips."

"It was as if first my stomach and then my entire abdomen were filling up
with acid, as if sticky, red-hot little starfish were attaching themselves to my organs."

"On the little tray before the mirror bearing Füsun’s, Aunt Nesibe’s, and Uncle Tarık’s toothbrushes, as well as shaving soap, brush, and razor, I saw Füsun’s lipstick. I picked it up and sniffed it, then put it into my pocket."