This is when I realize that Anna has already left the table, and more importantly, that nobody noticed.

I can see myself now, she said. And I can see what I want to be, ten years from now. But I don't understand how I'm going to get from here to there.

As a child, what I was missing was so much bigger to me than what I had. My mother-mythic, imaginary-was a deity and a superhero and a comfort all at once. If only I'd had her, surely, she would have been the answer to every problem; if only I'd had her , she would have been the cure for everything that ever had gone wrong in my life.

Is Fate getting what you deserve, or deserving what you get?

I think there are readers out there and I don't think the book is dead. And more importantly I don't think readers have to choose between literary and commercial fiction.

Parenting is really just a matter of tracking, of hoping your kids do not get so far ahead you can no longer see their next moves.

Many trees have died so that the Catholic Church can preach against homosexuality.