"Other men rose from nothing, didn't they? Messiahs, presidents, movie stars. They pulled themselves up out of the mud the way the fishes had done when they'd decided to go for a walk." Part One, Chap. 1, p.11

"There were mysteries to be unveiled, and powers to be seized, and when he was King of the World he'd pull down the suburbs (and the sun if he could) and make the world over in a hot darkness where a man might finally get to know the secrets of his own soul." Part One, Chap. 2, p. 22

"The old man's manner—his arrogant little smile, his shrugs, the way he half closed his lids as though using all his gaze on his guest would be a waste of eyesight—all of this made Jaffe think of Homer. They could have been two halves of a double-act; the lumpen boor...