“Lucy, who apparently had no idea his girlfriend's father held him in such low regard, agreed with Noonan that he was pushing… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“... Mr. Purty has cheered me up. The task he has chosen for himself, of wooing my mother with a bright red… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“There have been times," Father Mark admitted, "when I feared that God would turn out to be like my maternal grandmother [...]… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Interesting, Miles thought. Like himself, Father Mark, as a child, had been reassured by the imagined proximity of God, whereas adults, perhaps… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“My mother has always been the sort of woman whose emotional state can be intuited from the volume at which she rattles… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Though here his voice faltered, because he knew as well as she did what came next, what words came next. If he… — richard russo Copy Share Image
“He's such a good man," my mother said. "How I wish I loved him." "He's certainly crazy about you," I said, trying… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Bullshitting god would be Max's plan in a nutshell. Miles could even guess his father's opening gambit. He'd point out to God… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
The world is divided between kids who grow up wanting to be their parents and those like us, who grow up wanting… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“...the truth is, we never know for sure about ourselves. Who we'll sleep with if given the opportunity, who we'll betray in… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“For people who dealt largely in dreams, his father was fond of observing, realtors were a surprisingly unromantic bunch, like card counters… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
What does it feel like to be a parent? What does it feel like to be a child? And that's what stories… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“I don't tell you this story today in order to encourage all of you in the class of '04 to find careers… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“It was from my mother that I learned reading was not a duty but a reward, and from her that I intuited… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Griffin’s mother loathed grading papers, too, of course. Who didn’t? But she was meticulous about correcting errors, offering style and content suggestions… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Because the truth is, we never know for sure about ourselves. Who we'll sleep with if given the opportunity, who we'll betray… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“The drive back to the Mid-fucking-west was always brutal, his parents barely speaking to each other, as if suddenly recalling last year's… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“My mother had more than once remarked that my father was one of the war's casualties, that the Sam Hall who came… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“The task he has chosen for himself, of wooing my mother with a bright red pickup truck, a Patsy Cline tape, and… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
I told him the truth, that I loved him and didn't regret anything about our lives together. But do we ever 'tell… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“It’s not an easy time for any parent, this moment when the realization dawns that you’ve given birth to something that will… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
Which is why we have spouses and children and parents and colleagues and friends, because someone has to know us better than… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“It was hard to imagine him in love. I knew that he and my mother must have once felt passion, since that… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“It pleased him to imagine God as someone like his mother, someone beleagured by too many responsibilities, too dog-tired to monitor an… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“The problem with the contemplative life was that there was no end to contemplation, no fixed time limit after which thought had to be… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“That, very simply, was what adulthood must be all about—acquiring the skill to bury things more deeply. Out of sight and, whenever possible, out… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Miles couldn't help admiring women for their ability to dismiss the evidence of their senses. If that's what explained it. If it wasn't simply… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
That afternoon I came to understand that one of the deepest purposes of intellectual sophistication is to provide distance between us and our most… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Lucy, who apparently had no idea his girlfriend's father held him in such low regard, agreed with Noonan that he was pushing the envelope,… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
Movies have to handle time very efficiently. They're about stringing scenes together in the present. Novels aren't necessarily about that. — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
When authors who write literary fiction begin to write screenplays, everybody assumes that's the end. Here's another who's never going to write well again. — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“There was something about spending money they didn't really have that made him optimistic about more coming in.” — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
Some authors have a very hard time understanding that in order to be faithful to the spirit of the book, it's almost always impossible… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
HBO is really famous for hiring good people and staying out of their way until they ask for help, or need it. And that… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
I don't think there's a shortage of material in the world. Or in my head. I just pray for continued good health, because I've… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
Where was the middle ground between a sense of adventure and just plain sense? — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
