Lissa Carlson

“There might have been alcoholics in the group, Cassidy knew, but most of them were too young to know it yet. Cassidy didn't think he was one, but he wasn't sure. He was certainly capable of overdoing things, and not just booze. He figured it was that thing–that thing about going too far–that maybe made him a good runner and a good diver and sometimes a hair brained poet. It made his life exhilarating and sometimes ridiculous at the same time.”
― John L. Parker Jr., Again to Carthage

“Louise closed her eyes. She could not define what she was feeling but knew no other way to express it than to say that she loved him. So that's what she said. It occurred to her that you only get glimpses of love, your whole life, just bits and pieces.”
― Tom Drury

“And as short as two miles had come to seem to him over the course of his running career, it occurred to him now that two miles was an insurmountable distance to an infant, or a legless man, or a human cadaver for that matter. Einstein was right, he decided. It is all relative.”
― John L. Parker Jr., Again to Carthage

“Cassidy readily understood that most dreamy high school thespians would not become international movie stars; most tots prancing across stages wearing rhinestone tiaras would not become Miss America; most ROTC standouts would not become heroes or astronauts.

But at the same time he was pretty sure that a few would. He had to believe in his heart that some of them would do these things. He understood that, even if Gary Castleton did not.”
― John L. Parker Jr., Racing the Rain