Prayer is a practical strategy, the gaining of temporal advantage in the capital markets of Sin and Remission.

The genius of rock music is that it matched the cultural hysteria around it.

The novel is the dream release, the suspension of reality that history needs to escape its own brutal confinements.

Doesn't our knowledge of death make life more precious?' What good is a preciousness based on fear and anxiety? It's an anxious quivering thing

In my experience, writing a novel tends to create its own structure, its own demands, its own language, its own ending. So for much of the period in which I'm writing, I'm waiting to understand what's going to happen next, and how and where it's going to happen. In some cases, fairly early in the process, I do know how a book will end. But most of the time, not at all, and in this particular case, many questions are still unanswered, even though I've been working for months.

days like this. i look at you and feel electric. tell me you don't feel it too."_Eric Packer

The modern meaning of life's end-when does it end? How does it end? How should it end? What is the value of life? How do we measure it?