I think that there are empty ecological niches in the literary landscape crying to be filled and when a book more or less fills a niche it's seized on, even when it's a far from perfect fit...
Edmund WhiteWhen we are young... we often experience things in the present with a nostalgia-in-advance, but we seldom guess what we will truly prize years from now.
Edmund WhiteThe almost Oriental politeness of the West Coast is one of its distinctive regional features, in marked contrast to the contentiousness of the East Coast.... So few human contacts in Los Angeles go unmediated by glass (either a TV screen or an automobile windshield), that the direct confrontation renders the participants docile, stunned, sweet.
Edmund White