The response to my books from my East Coast friends has been wildly various, running the gamut from 'bad' to 'very bad.' (Is there another gamut?)

Appearance versus reality? Appearance is reality, God damn it!

This world may be only illusion -- but it's the only illusion we've got.

Jane Austen: Getting into her books is like getting in bed with a cadaver. Something vital is lacking; namely, life.

For myself I hold no preferences among flowers, so long as they are wild, free, spontaneous. Bricks to all greenhouses! Black thumb and cutworm to the potted plant!

Let us praise the noble turkey vulture: No one envies him; he harms nobody; and he contemplates our little world from a most serene and noble height.

Salome had but seven veils; the artist has a thousand.