“endless soaring toy-rocket dreams and schemes that let out a sad, weak 'pop' at their high climax point and then flake apart as they tumble toward some thorn patch that's also a hatching ground for baby snakes”

“His thoughts were clearly still shoving him further away, toward some ultimate dark drama that he might or might not have actually lived through but whose telling would let out the pressure inside his skull.”

“I just wasn't ready for his stories. They'd breed with the others I'd heard and hatch new monsters, because there was no such thing as separation here, not once you'd started listening. Never listen.”

“My advice for aspiring writers is go to New York. And if you can’t go to New York, go to the place that represents New York to you, where the standards for writing are high, there are other people who share your dreams, and where you can talk, talk, talk about your interests. Writing books begins in talking about it, like most human projects, and in being close to those who have already done what you propose to do.”

“Overpopulation has a ceiling: earth’s total surface area divided by the dimensions of one economy seat. One more baby is born and hello cannibalism.”

“I preferred that my bad dreams be vague.”

“Thoughts are thoughts and that's all they are.”