I didn't finish the stories until we went to the Philippines and I got malaria. I couldn't work and I didn't have any money, but I had seven stories. So I wrote three or four more.

I really enjoy writing novels. It's like the ocean. You can just build a boat and take off.

I didn’t want to get to know her very well, and didn’t want to be bridging any silences with our eyes.

My habit when I’ve been humiliated is to go out and buy a book.

Staring at his own face reflected in a cup of bitter karma. For.

The coyotes sounded like hurt dogs. They agitated plainly for Christ’s return. May they not be heard.

I don’t remember what I said to them. I remember loneliness crushing first my lungs. Then my heart. Then my balls.

But every time I entered the place there were veiled faces promising everything and then clarifying quickly into the dull, the usual, looking up at me and making the same mistake.

Skip experienced no excitement. Only the lethargy and sadness of a man freezing to death.

I answered instantly, pointing out that in order to accept this proof that Elvis was in Paradise in 1958, we first have to accept life after death, Paradise, ghosts, all of that. Mark answered a couple of days later, I smile and shrug. Life after death, ghosts, Paradise, eternity – of course, we take all that as granted. Otherwise where’s the fun?