“. . . I spent much of my youth wondering about the verticality of my own biological progenitors. So that when I reached the age of majority, I set out to discover who they were, only to uncover a shameful parade of bastards, miscreants, and foolhardy eccentrics”

“Does being self-aware magically negate all our other predatory instincts? After all, humans put the ape in apex predator. We are the best of the best. Top drawer. Our only natural enemy is, well, God, and he’s really quite wishy-washy when it comes to predation. The whole mercy and forgiveness thing weakens his predatory resolve.”

“From the place by the railing at the edge of the tracks on the summer evening I return across the city to my own room. I am vividly aware of my own life that escaped the winter on the boat. How many such lives I have lived. Then I only made a dollar and a half a day and now I sometimes make more than that in a few minutes. How wonderful to be able to write words. ... Again I begin the endless game of reconstructing my own life, jerking it out of the shell that dies, striving to breathe into it beauty and meaning. ... I wonder why my life, why all lives, are not more beautiful.”

“When I was a teenager, most fathers tended to go berserk when I asked their daughters on a date.... I discovered that all fathers go berserk when their daughters start dating. I have to assume this was because all fathers were once teenagers at some point in their lives, so they had no illusions about whether or not the boys were “up to something.”

“It appears these days I don't have much of a life because my nose is often stuck in a book. But I discovered that reading builds a life inside the mind.”

“Not all was as it seemed, he realized in the simple rendering of a child’s comprehension. Not all was good and honorable in this world. And for young Robrecht, there was something thrilling in this simple fact. For him, it was as if on that morning long ago the colors of the sky and earth—the dirt road, the brick and plaster buildings, the gleaming sea—had suddenly become not just brighter and more vibrant but also richer—the deeper shades of a complex and multifarious world.”

“He was so heartrendingly perfect he took my breath away. I wondered how I could have been so lucky to have met him, much less have him sacrifice so much of his time for me. There isn't anything I wouldn't do for him. I think I fell for him the first moment I laid eyes on him, but over the weeks my feelings had grown and grown. I had to admit that I was in love- deeply, endlessly, hopelessly, head over heels in love.”