How strange to read of a place in a book, and then stand on it, listen to the birds sing, and spit on the cobbles if you want.

Arterial-plaque specials that save minutes now can cost years, later on.

The last generation's worst fears became the next one's B-grade entertainment.

They all attended Hester's church, which Dellarobia viewed as a complicated pyramid scheme of moral debt and credit resting ultimately on the shoulders of the Lord, but rife with middle managers.

A certain feeling comes from throwing your good life away, and it is one part rapture.

I do my best work if I think about what it is I have to offer.

I look at my four boys, who are the colors of silt, loam, dust, and clay, an infinite palette for children of their own, and I understand that time erases whiteness altogether.