"Even before that, when I was in a convent, a sweet little nun asked me to get her a script of a screen play so she could 'teach her class about movie writing' as she had taught them about the essay and the short story. I got the script for her, and I suppose she puzzled over it and puzzled over it, but it was never mentioned in class, and she gave it back to me with an air of offended surprise and not a single comment. That's what I half expect to happen to this story."

Chapter 1, pg. 9

"At both ends of life man needed nourishment: a breast--a shrine. Something to lay himself beside when no one wanted him further, and shoot a bullet into his head." Chapter 1, pg. 21

"Obviously Stahr had put the pilots right up on the throne with him and let them rule with...