When they kissed she immediately felt his tongue, tensed and strong, pushing past her teeth, like some bully shouldering his way into a room. Entering her.

In a nuclear age, and in an age of serious environmental degradation, apocalyptic belief creates a serious second order danger. The precarious logic of self-interest that saw us through the Cold War would collapse if the leaders of one nuclear state came to welcome, or ceased to fear mass death.

Not everything people did could be in a correct, logical order, especially when they were alone.

Politics is the enemy of the imagination.

He had never before felt so self-consciously young, nor experienced such appetite, such impatience for the story to begin.

Observing human variety can give pleasure, but so too can human sameness.

This is the pain-pleasure of having newly adult children; they're innocent and ruthless in forgetting their sweet old dependence.