Empire Falls

“Slow” works on an altogether different principle, on the deceptive impression that there’s plenty of time to prepare, which conceals the central fact, that no matter how slow things go, you’ll always be slower.

Just because things happen slow doesn’t mean you’ll be ready for them.

it was a lot easier to forget a thousand things you wanted to remember than the one thing you wanted to lose sight of.

The terrible truth was that such slender gestures seemed even to Miles, at sixteen, both too much and too little, more than just about everyone else was willing to do but far less than conscience dictated.

Good fences make good neighbors.

If chickens had any idea what was in store for them, they’d stay where they were in their eggs.

Being mayor of Empire Falls was a full-time job with a part-time salary,

They stayed, many of them, because staying was easier and less scary than leaving, and because for a while at least they’d be able to draw unemploy

They stayed, many of them, because staying was easier and less scary than leaving, and because for a while at least they’d be able to draw unemploy

Of the younger man who had wanted to live and die in Mexico and dream and paint and write poetry there was now little evidence.