“Of course many bars in Manhasset, like bars everywhere, were nasty places, full of pickled people marinating in regret.”

“The only reason people go to bars is to get drunk and have sex. To me, bars are what hell is like.”

“The Morning After Coffee Bar was different from the mass-produced coffee bars that had mushroomed on every street almost everywhere, a development which presaged the flattening effects of globalisation; the spreading, under a cheerful banner, of a sameness that threatened to weaken and destroy all sense of place.”

“Once you left Easterly, you saw the world was full of these people: ticket sellers, snack bar clerks. They assumed they were better than you just because they knew their own routines.”

“Life seemed to him to be a narrow cage, and her iron bars were many and dense, and there was only one way out.”

“If I’m to be a ghost,” I told Caps, “I’m not haunting your aunt’s gloomy old place. I’d choose someplace livelier, more fun.”　　“Such as?”　　“A gay bar, of course.”