"Eleven years ago I woke up to find the room spinning. In the soft blue-gray light of morning, the walls folded and slid and picked up speed."

"It was the moonlight that caused the problem. Or maybe it was the way the sky opened up over the forgotten parts of Alaska after forty days of thirty-five degrees and raining."

"I was working in the sub-basement of a chemistry lab. I’d only been there one year, I was 26 years old, and I was pretty sure I was wasting my life."

"The day I went to a murderer’s house alone, he hadn’t killed anyone yet."

"On the first anniversary of your death, there were curtains of lightning—bright flashes every few seconds, the smell of things burning, the weight of rain in my clothes as I ran for cover."

"In the way of five-year-olds, my kindergartener is convinced he knows sign language."

"In the predawn light the walls let go and start to spin."

"Greenpeace had arrived in Alaska. And they were after us."

"You’re not that bad, I tell people all the time."

"Anna and I are collecting bear hair."

"n the spring of 1992, I was counting calories, buying a Blow Pop at a high school soccer game, when the mom on the other side of the concession stand grabbed my wrist."

"When you run into a bear in the backcountry of Alaska, there are certain things you should not do."