“It seemed that both had lately had a touch of that pain under the waistband which comes of a sedentary life.”

“I had no intention of getting involved with a tattooed, spikey-haired rock dude who wore his waistband under his ass cheeks, slept around and had commitment issues. Those were the types that had me running from the hills.”

“The people say that the two seemed to be removed from human experience; that they had gone through pain and had come out on the other side.”

“On the earth, satellite of a star speeding through space, living things had arisen under the influence of conditions which were part of the planet's history; and as there had been a beginning of life upon it, so, under the influence of other conditions, there would be an end: man, no more significant than other forms of life, had come not as the climax of creation but as a physical reaction to the environment.”

“The island had come to seem one of those places seen from the train that belong to a life in which we shall never take part.”

“So much of my life had been under tight control. So much of Quinn's life had been wild insanity. What we needed now was both: a directed burst of controlled insanity.”