The guitar," I said, "will only obey its master." "Yeah," Cole agreed, "but Grace isn't here." He grinned at me slyly.

Everything mattered and nothing did, and I was tired of trying to find out how both of those things were true. I was an itch that I'd scratched so hard I was bleeding. I had set out to do the impossible, whatever the impossible might be, only to find out that it was living with myself. Suicide became an expiration date, the day after which I no longer had to try.

In the end, you have to write like you're not afraid of the critics.

My words are unerring tools of destruction, and I’ve come unequipped with the ability to disarm them.

The inside of the old Camaro smelled like asphalt and desire, gasoline and dreams.

To Grace, these were the things that mattered: my hands on her cheeks, my lips on her mouth. The fleeting touches that meant I loved her.

I always wanted an eccentric daughter . I just never realized how well my evil plans were working.