"The truth was...he was in love with her. Totally over-the-line, no-going-back, not-even-dead-would-he-part kind of shit."

"The hardest thing is being with other people - it's like they're on a different wavelenght, but only you know it. They talk about their lives and what's wrong with them, and you kind of, like, just let them go. It's a whole different language, and you've got to remember that you can only respond in their mother tongue. It's really hard to relate."

"Someone put opera on inside the house. Someone changed it to hip-hop, thank God. Someone started a shower. Someone vacuumed. Again.Life. In all its mundane majesty.And you couldn't take advantage of it if you were sitting on your ass in the shadows... whether it was in actuality, or metaphorically because you were trapped in an attic's darkness."

"Well, wasn't this a night for firsts. Sex. Arson. Pants."

"Qhuinn's eyes shifted away from his buddy--and just happened to measure the distance down to the stone patio below. Hmm . . . doing a swan dive onto all that slate might just get the images of those two out of his head... of course, it would also turn his brain into scrambled eggs, but really, was that such a bad thing?"

"Caregivers had to take care of themselves, and part of that meant having a life beyond whatever illness had put them in their cole."

"God, he was probably too young to be this old, but life had a way of being about experience, rather than calendar days."

"The thing was, the places of your life, like the clothes you wore and the car you drove and the friends and associates you had, were a product of the way you lived."

"You've won the evolutionary lottery: You're a vampire. Let's go to Disneyland!"

"An active mind didn't need distractions in its physical environment. It needed a collection of outstanding books and a good lamp. Maybe some cheese and crackers."

"I was dead unit you found me, though I breathed. I was sightless, though I could see. And then you came...and I was awakened."

"Welcome to the wonderful world of jealousy, he thought. For the price of admission, you get a splitting headache, a nearly irresistable urge to commit murder, and an inferiority complex. Yippee."

"A book unopened alters not the ink on its pages. What is there is there."

"Whoa. Fangs. She had fangs.She leaned in, prodded them a little. Eating with those puppies was going to take some getting used to, she thought.On impulse, she brought up her hands, turned her fingers into claws. Hissed.Cool."

"Look upon me, Mistress. Watch as I wither!"

"Terrific. A bisexual dominant vampire with kidnapping expertise."

"In the silence, she felt the past and the present shift and mix, but that was a mirage. There was no way to comfort the lost boy he'd been back then. But she had the grown male.She had him right in her arms, and for a brief moment of whimsy, she imagined that she was never, ever going to let him go."

"Sometimes in life, from out of a myriad of prosaic decisions like what to eat and where to sleep and how to dress, a true crossroads is revealed. In these moments, when the fog of relative irrelevancy lifts and fate rolls out a demand for free will, there is only left or right " no option of four-by-fouring into the underbrush between two paths, no negotiating with the choice that has been presented. You must answer the call and pick your way. And there is no reverse."

"It felt odd to realize she was frightened more by what he might know, and not of what he might be."

"Falling into ruin was a bit like falling in love: Both descents stripped you bare and left you as you were at your core. And both endings are equally painful."

"Indeed, the human mind appeared to suffer from a crippling need to fabricate in the absence of concrete proof."

"His ears caught a sweet chiming noise, and a moment later a warm rush fell over his body. How we doing Rhage? Too hot? Butch's voice. Up close. The cop was in the shower with him. And he smelled Turkish tobacco. V must be in the bathroom too. Hollywood? This too hot for you? No. He reached around for the soap, fumbling. Can't see. Just as well. No reason for you to know what we look naked together. Frankly, I'm traumatized enough for the both of us. Rhage smiled a little as a washcloth scrubbed over his face, neck and chest."

"When I picked up the bird and felt its light weight in my hands, I realized that carelessness was a form of cruelty. See, I'd always told myself that because I meant no harm, anything that happened wasn't my fault. At that moment, though, I knew I was wrong. If I hadn't given the female my gun, the bird wouldn't have been shot. I was responsible even though I didn't pull the trigger."

"Life is such a glorious trauma, is it not?"

"Man, it was a good thing vampires didn't get cancer. Lately he'd been chain-smoking like a felon."

"Michael Rafferty was a goodman. A solid man. He was never going to be Hugh Jackman handsome or Bill Gates rich or King of England powerful. But he was hers and he was Sean's and that was more than enough."

"Wrath: What the hell are you supposed to ask?Rhage: I know! Who do you like the most? It's me right?Come on, you know it is. Come oooooonnnnn-Butch: If its you,, I'll kill myself.V: No, that just means she's blind.Rhage: It has to be me.V: She said she didn't like you at first.Rhage: Ah, but I won her over, which is more than anyone else can say about you, hot stuff.J.R.: I don't like anyone the bestWrath: Right answer.Rhage: She's just sparing all of you feelings. (grins, becoming impossibly handsome) She's so polite.J.R.: Next question?Rhage: Why do you like me the best?"

"As Qhuinn looked at his best friend's handsome face, he felt as if he'd never not known that red hair, those blue eyes, those lips, that jaw. And it was because of their long history that he searched for something to say, something that would get them back to where they had been. All that came to him was . . . I miss you. I miss you so fucking bad it hurts, but I don't know how to find you even though you're right in front of me."

"Rule number four for me as a writer? Plotlines are like sharks: They either keep moving or they die."

"Life. In all it's mundane majesty."

"He cleared his throat and reminded himself that if you pissed Her Holiness off, they'd need barbecue tongs to pick up your steaming pieces."

"Destiny was a machine built over time, each choice that you made in life adding another gear, another conveyor belt, another assemblyman. Where you ended up was the product that was spit out at the end-and there was no going back for a redo. You couldnYt take a peek at what youYd manufactured and decide, Oh, wait, I wanted to make sewing machines instead of machine guns; let me go back to the beginning and start again. One shot. That was all you got."

"Listen to me ... and I want you to remember this. Your legs are part of you, but not all of you or what you are. So wherever we go after tonight, I need you to know that you are no less for the injury. Even if you are in a chair, you still stand as tall as you ever did. Height is just a vertical number - it doesn't mean shit when it comes to your character or the kind of life you live."

"Funny thing about glass. When you broke the shit up, it got pissed and bit back."

"If sex were food, Rhage would have been morbidly obese."

"But that was life: Nobody got a guided tour to their own theme park. You had to hop on the rides as they presented themselves, never knowing whether you would like the one you were in line for...or if the bastard was going to make you throw up your corn dog and your cotton candy all over the place."

"As he shut the door, he was painfully aware that they were each talking about their young--only Wrath's had four paws and a tail.Least he didn't have to worry about George succeeding him or being blind."

"The heavy soul will not pass though the body is failing."