“ But no one could say he hadn't gotten even. He could not count the field women whom he had sexually degraded and demoralized and in whom he had left his seed so their bastard children would be a daily… James Lee Burke
“ I also believe my home state is cursed by ignorance and poverty and racism, much of it deliberately inculcated to control a vulnerable electorate. And I believe many of the politicians in Louisiana ar… James Lee Burke
“ The reason people don't buy conspiracy theories is they think 'conspiracy' means everybody's on the same program. That's not how it works. Everybody's got a different program. They just all want the s… James Lee Burke
“ Writing is like being in love. You never get better at it or learn more about it. The day you think you do is the day you lose it. Robert Frost called his work a lover's quarrel with the world. It's o… James Lee Burke
“ And like most middle-aged people who hear the clock ticking in their lives, I had come to resent a waste or theft of my time that was greater than any theft of my goods or money. James Lee Burke
“ And I wonder if there is any way to adequately describe the folly that causes us to undo all the great gifts of both Earth and Heaven. James Lee Burke
“ I had to feel sorry for Bubba's wife. In AA we called it denial. We take the asp to our breast and smile at the alarm we see in the eyes of others. James Lee Burke
“ The rain spun in the yellow arc lights over the café parking lot. It was empty inside, except for a fat Negro woman whom I could see through the service window in the kitchen, and a pretty, redheaded… James Lee Burke
“ As I was to learn, patience and latitude and even humility are, paradoxically, the handmaidens of wealth, because virtue is costly only for those who own nothing else. James Lee Burke
“ He wavin’ at you, Dave. Hey, it’s that drunk man done fell in the bayou the ot’er night. That man must surely love water. James Lee Burke
“ You make me resent myself, Troyce. That’s the worst thing somebody can do to somebody else. He looked at James Lee Burke
“ When a drunk gets eighty-sixed out of a bar, he’s not supposed to buy drinks for the people still inside. James Lee Burke
“ Cruelty and sentimentality are almost always companion characteristics in an individual but never cruelty and love. James Lee Burke
