“From the pocket of her windbreaker he extracted what he falsely believed to be a portable marine radio, which along with two granola bars he'd pilfered from Honey's belongings after she was snatched by the club-handed lunatic. Shreave started pressing buttons on the compact gadget and barking, "Mayday! Mayday!There was no response from the Coast Guard pilot or any other human, and for a good reason. Except for its LED screen, the instrument in Shreave's possession was electronically dissimilar to a radio in all significant respects. Most crucial was the absence of either an audio receiver or a transmitter."SOS! SOS!" he persisted. "Help!"The device was in fact a mobile GPS unit, as technogically impenetrable to Shreave as the Taser gun he'd found beneath Honey's bed.”

“Shreave flicked away the dead mosquito. "Don't these things carry the bird flu too?""No Boyd, that would be a bird.”

“The man's a born straggler, Honey thought, another lucky exception to the rules of natural selection. A million years ago he would've been an easy snack for a saber-toothed tiger.”

“The evening news made her wonder if God was dead; the morning sun made her believe He wasn't.”

“Garcia wondered why people with JESUS stickers on their bumper always drove twenty miles per hour under the speed limit. If God was my co-pilot, he thought, I'd be doing a hundred and twenty.”

“as a lobbyist he had long ago concluded there was no difference in how Democrats and Republicans conducted the business of government. The game stayed the same: It was always about favors and friends, and who controlled the dough. Party labels were merely a way to keep track of the teams; issues were mostly smoke and vaudeville. Nobody believed in anything except hanging on to power, whatever it took. .....”

“From the bow of the canoe she asked, "Do you know a rain dance?""First I need a virgin.”