And the commercials would have sickened a goat raised on barbed wire and broken beer bottles.

I hung up. It was a good start, but it didn’t go far enough. I ought to have locked the door and hidden under the desk.

She smelled the way the Taj Mahal looks by moonlight.

If my books had been any worse, I should not have been invited to Hollywood, and if they had been any better, I should not have come.

When I left Merle was wearing a bungalow apron and rolling pie crust. She came to the door wiping her hands on the apron and kissed me on the mouth and began to cry and ran back into the house, leaving the doorway empty [...] I had a funny feeling as I saw the house disappear, as though I had written a poem and it was very good and I had lost it and would never remember it again. (p. 262)

I like smooth shiny girls, hardboiled and loaded with sin.

I don’t mind if you don’t like my manners. They’re pretty bad. I grieve over them during the long winter evenings.