Downtown Owl: A Novel

Most of the time they didn’t even realize they were rich; almost without exception, they wrongly viewed themselves as middle-class. But there’s no such thing as middle-class. The middle class does not exist. If you believe you are part of the middle class, it just means you’re rich and insecure or poor and misinformed.

His quadriceps stored enough lactic acid to turn a triceratops into limestone.

Like all self-destructive creatures, she completely meant these words, but only while she spoke them.

Tonight. You can meet my boyfriend. Well, he’s actually not my boyfriend—I’m married and I don’t cheat on my husband, but I still have a boyfriend. You know what I mean? You know what I mean. You know what I mean. So if you have an extra liver, you might want to throw it into your glove box. I might need to chew on it.”

Their wedding was picturesque and well attended. She was vivacious and loquacious, which made her flirtatious. Words ending in -ious are bad for marriages. Her

Their misplaced adoration makes them seem foolish and immature, so you cannot reciprocate their respect. It instantaneously makes the relationship unbalanced. And this imbalance makes you feel guilty, so you start to unconsciously resent the idolization. Over time, you find yourself hating people for loving you too much, which seems like a terrible

emotive intensity of an attraction devoid of explanation. Julia knew this was ridiculous. She felt like a ridiculous person. She did not care. It was so much fun to imagine theoretical conversations the two of them might have, and to mentally replay their previous conversations in the hope of finding subtext.

Sleeping pills help people reach sleep; fatal familial insomnia makes sleep unreachable. The protein in Alma’s brain had changed, and it could not be changed back.

“Holy shit,” said Naomi. “Jules, you look like a thirty-thousand-dollar hooker. You look fantastic. We are going to get a million free drinks tonight. That skirt is like a Burmese penis trap.”