All of us write wish fulfillment.

People spend thousands of dollars on stereos. Sometimes tens of thousands. There is a specialist industry right here in the States which builds stereo gear to a standard you wouldn't believe. Tubed amplifiers which cost more than a house. Speakers taller than me. Cables thicker than a garden hose. Some army guys had that stuff. I'd heard it on bases around the world. Wonderful. But they were wasting their money. Because the best stereo in the world is free. Inside your head. It sounds as good as you want it to. As loud as you want it to be.

Many years from now when your children ask what New York City was like just after 9/11, this will be the book you give them in response. It's an exquisite novel full of heart, soul, passion and intelligence, and it's the one this great New York author was born to write.

My mother still calls me Jim and that is about it. Everyone else calls me Lee. My wife calls me whatever.

I'm not a vagrant... I'm a hobo. Big difference.

Lone women shouldn't stop in the middle of nowhere for giant unkempt strangers with duct tape on their faces.

What do I miss about the UK? Sadly, almost nothing. Maybe the midnight sun, in June in the north. That's all.