"Hope. That’s all anyone ever talked about on the convoy, especially as we got closer. Hope, hope, hope.


All this hope, and here I was, right at the very edge of it, looking out into the darkness, the first to see it coming, the first to greet it when we found out what it really looked like.


But what if? ‘Is it because hope is scary?’ my father asked. I looked back at him, startled. ‘You think so, too?’ He smiled, full of love.


‘Hope is terrifying, Viola,’ he said. ‘No one wants to admit it, but it is.’ I feel my eyes go wet again.


‘Then how can you stand it? How can you bear even thinking it? It feels so dangerous, like you’ll be punished for even thinking you deserved it.’


He touched my arm, just lightly. ‘Because, Viola, life is so much more terrifying without it.’"

(excerpt from Patrick Ness’ The New World)