They were going to have to leave. Again. That was just how things were. Miriam was used to it. The only way to keep from suffering, she knew, was just to move forward, to keep going, and never, never look back.
-- Narrator (Book I: Chapter 7)

Importance: Toward the outset of the narrative, the author utilizes this quotation to introduce her thematic inspection of survival. As a child, Myriam recognizes that the family does not move and relocate for adventure. The moves are a means of protecting themselves from physical and economic danger. Berest suggests that persistence and tenacity are inextricable from survival. When the individual is complacent, they no longer have the tools to survive.

That melancholy feeling that these were the last day, that life as it was had been irretrievably lost.
-- Narrator (Book I: Chapter 18)

Importance: In Book I, Chapter 18, the author expands her thematic examination of loss when the Rabinovitch family spends the last days of summer...