“The sky was low and broody, but from here, near the treeline, you could see the forest rolling down into the valley, the lake tucked away like a pocket mirror.”

“Punk had picked the locks, sluiced out into the grid.”

“Some people think the real them is whoever they are when they're not around other people.”

“It's like Charlie's dreamed everything he lived through here.”

“William loathed his family,' Mercer said. 'With cause.”

“As ever in the family Goodman, someone would have to swallow feelings here, and it was easier that it be Mercer.”

“July 4th fireworks exhale over the Hudson sadly.It is beautiful that they have to disappear.It's like the time you said I love you madly.That was an hour ago. It's been a fervent year.”

“When you meet someoneso different from yourself,in a good way,you dont even have to kissto have fireworks go off.”

“Life isn't always about fireworks. Your fireworks will come, Sarah. And they'll fizzle out just as fast. Life's an experience, not a destination. All of us have the same destination, but not one of...”

“Sex can be used either for self-affirmation or for self-transcendence either to intensify the ego and consolidate the social persona by some kind of conspicuous embarkation and heroic conquest, or...”

“He didn't know all that much about how the machinery worked anyway. Such knowledge was for specialists. In war, as in love, he was a fearless, happy-go-lucky adventurer.”

“If she did experience sex--or something close to it--in high school, I'm sure it would have been less out of sexual desire or love than literary curiosity.”

“He wanted the songs, the stories, to save everybody.”