less real than such threats as a man with a gun, a woman with a knife, or a U.S. Senator with an idea.

Pain can be endured and defeated only if it is embraced. Denied or feared, it grows.

That was interesting, riding in the trunk," Milo said, "but I wouldn't want to do it again.

Writing a novel is like making love, but it's also like having a tooth pulled. Pleasure and pain. Sometimes it's like making love while having a tooth pulled.

Then what are you? An electronic Hannibal Lector? You can't eat my liver with fava beans through a modem, you know.

When life hands us a beutiful bouquet of flowers we stare at it in cautious expectation of a bee.

Night has patterns that can be read less by the living than by the dead.