“I'm a thirty-something gay man with a dodgy heart. I sell books for a living. Who wants to read about that?”

“There is a great deal of difference between an eager man who wants to read a book and a tired man who wants a book to read.”

“Any man who isn't married by thirty-five is either gay or he's got skeletons in his closet.”

“This is the most important thing about me--I'm a card-carrying reader. All I really want to do is sit and read or lie down and read or eat and read or shit and read. I'm a trained reader. I want a job where I get paid for reading books. And I don't have to make reports on what I read or to apply what I read.”

“Let me tell you about gays in the military. I don't want any gay people hanging around me while I'm killing kids. I just don't want to see it.”

“What is my life for and what am I going to do with it? I don't know and I'm afraid. I can never read all the books I want; I can never be all the people I want and live all the lives I want.”