“The planet was filling up with good-looking young worldlings built entirely of opposites, canceling themselves out and- speaking as a bloke- leaving nothing you'd honestly want to go for a drink with. This new species of guys paired city shoes with backwoods beards. They played in bands but they worked in offices. They hated the rich but they bought lottery tickets, they laughed at comedies about the shittiness of lives that were based quite pointedly on their own, and worst of all they were so endlessly bloody gossipy. Every single thing they did, from unboxing a phone through to sleeping with his athlese, they had this compulsion to stick it online and see what everyone else thought. Their lives were a howling vacuum that sucked in attention. He didn't see how Zoe could ever find love with this new breed of men with cyclonic souls that sucked like Dysons and never needed their bag changed in order to keep on and on sucking.”

“The police up in the city had endless files filled with people who were so malevolent it was almost impossible to believe they were real. People for whom children were toys. When they were broken they were simply replaced.The internet helped these people connect. Helped them find the pictures to feed the habit, and then it helped them find what they wanted. Everything was available for a price. The fucking animals went online and ordered themselves a child to play with. They went online and found some other sicko who thought the same way they did and all of a sudden they weren’t deranged or evil—they were just part of a special club. Pete could actually feel the blood in his arms heat up just thinking about it.”

“Men sucked. They were the root of every problem any woman could ever have. They were the reason for bras, the need for makeup, hair stylists, shaving legs,and high heels that made the arch feel like it had a steel rod slammed up it. They were picky, arrogant, argumentative, and so damned certain of themselves <...>.”

“Had I been wrong about Ryan? Did he beat Noah up and leave him there for me to suck the remaining breath from his unconscious body? Were we like some anti-superhero duo, working together to spread our evil stepsibling karma across the planet?”

“I had a real revelation. We were all in robes, and they made some Turkish coffee for us. The professor explained how the coffee was made very different from anywhere else, and I realized, 'So fucking what?' Which kids even in Turkey give a shit about Turkish coffee? All day I had looked at young people in Istanbul. They were all drinking what every other kind in the world drinks, and they were wearing clothes that look like they were bought at the Gap, and they are all using cell phones. They were like kids everywhere else. It hit me that, for young people, this whole world is the same now. When we're making products, there is no such thing as a Turkish phone, or a music player that young people in Turkey would want that's different from one young people elsewhere would want. We're just one world now.”

“It sucked to be old enough to want to know what was going on, but so young you were always dismissed.”