Hell is being alive, and being alive is all there is. - Michael Marshall Smith

I'm not sure I'd want to pick the brain of any author. Some writers have a lot to say about what they write and why they write it. Others don't. I've met a lot of writers who have an awful lot to say in the bar, but whose books seem curiously empty.

One of the big things about being a man, she'd noted, was that being good, doing the work, wasn't enough. It had to be generally acknowledged that here you were, damn well seeing to business.

It was dry and cold, not bitter, but with the kind of steady chill that makes it hard to remember being any other way. I tried to imagine people living out here once, and couldn't. It must have been long ago. The land felt like it didn't want anyone bothering it anymore.