I felt no shame in these activities, because I understood what almost no one else seemed to grasp: that there was only an infinitesimal difference, a difference so small that it barely existed except as a figment of the human imagination, between working in a tall green glass building on Park Avenue and collecting litter in a park. In fact, there may have been no difference at all.

The pause makes you think the song will end. And then the song isn't really over, so you're relieved. But then the song does actually end, because every song ends, obviously, and THAT. TIME. THE. END. IS. FOR. REAL.

She was clean": no piercings, tattoos, or scarifications. All the kids were now. And who could blame them, Alex thought, after watching three generations of flaccid tattoos droop like moth-eaten upholstery over poorly stuffed biceps and saggy asses?

The bottom line is that I like my first drafts to be blind, unconscious, messy efforts; that's what gets me the best material.

Americans are less selfish than some of our politicians believe and will respond with reason and resilience to passionate clarity.

I'm always happy," Sasha said. "Sometimes I just forget.

She'd risked everything, and here was the result: the raw, warped core of her life.