“If I had thought the beef marrow might be a hell of a lot of work for not much difference, I needn’t have worried. The taste of the marrow is rich, meaty, intense in a nearly-too-much way. In my increasingly depraved state, I could think of nothing at first but that it tasted like really good sex. But there was something more than that, even. What it really tastes like is life, well lived. Of course the cow I got marrow from had a fairly crappy life – lots of crowds and overmedication and bland food that might or might not have been a relative. But deep in his or her bones, there was a capacity for feral joy. I could taste it.”

“Women worry too much about how they smell or taste. I assure you, I love to taste a woman’s primal essence on my tongue.” Something melted inside her. He liked it? “Really? You’re not just being polite, are you, Sir?” “No, kitten, when it comes to sex, I don’t have a polite bone in my body.”

“Joy might be God- in the marrow of our bones.”

“Her face crashes. She hasn't dealt with a single transfusion or lumbar puncture. She wasn't allowed near me for the bone-marrow transplant, but she could have been there for any number of diagnoses, and wasn't. Even her promises to visit more often have faded away with Christmas. It's her turn to taste some reality.”

“Friendship is the most important thing in my life. It's rare to have friends like I've got. If I had as great a taste in husbands as I have in friends, what an even better life I would have had!”

“When someone between twenty and forty says, apropos of a work of art, 'I know what I like,' he is really saying 'I have no taste of my own but accept the taste of my cultural milieu.”