In America right now, we use words like 'smart' to talk about bombs. American rhetoric is grounded in ideas of capital-G Good, capital-E Evil, and it's very clear who is on which side. But in a book you can do just the opposite. You can use all lower-case words.

Once you hear something, you can never return to the time before you heard it.

...and when is enough proof enough?

Please be truthful, but also please be benevolent, please.

Family are the people who must make you feel ashamed when you are deserving of shame.

How beautiful is forgetting! What relief it would be for the world to lose some of its contents.

Almost always when I told someone I was writing a book about "eating animals", they assumed, even without knowing anything about my views, that it was a case for vegetarianism. It's a telling assumption, one that implies not only that a thorough inquiry into animal agriculture would lead one away from eating meat, but that most people already know that to be the case.