They were under arrest because they didn't have enough money to do business with the cops.

Employ hackers to adulterate the online versions of Hamlet.

For a diver, fear brings trouble.

I’ll either leave here dead—or something worse.

Did you forget you’re supposed to slow down going downhill?

Under my skin, my father / invades me.

I thought how I could spend a week just looking at her behind

But only one chair was Father's chair, the heir's chair.

Borzu Alvandi will always wonder why he wasn’t martyred.

With his eyes bulging, Mr. Moadab murmurs, It’s like silk . . .

I lost two people, I’ll take two people . . . with this very bayonet.

He sets off, a few steps ahead of me. I follow him.

I was looking at the sky when suddenly a shower of bullets pierced my chest.

I leave and return with a large piece of sky.

You want me to grant your wish, you must satisfy my need.

By the way, how old am I? I can’t remember.

She was now sitting half-naked in front of the door.

The national sport of Spain, not counting soccer, is drinking cold beer and eating tapas.

Translators are often congratulated, but never admired.

As they wearied, the whips would fall from their hands.

That way we could both have our own family, but carry on seeing each other in secret.

Her Swiss friend had assured her that she was no longer the only lesbian in Yugoslavia.

We bit one another mercilessly.

The bird lay motionless and dead and infinitely small upon his massive palm.

I too am a child. How would I know how to look after a baby?

I implored him softly, Kill me! Kill me!

You can’t drink when you have the money on you.

Riuki was from the village, but he lacked village sense.

Where did you get a Somali child?

Wasn’t it your bloody rabbit that laid the egg?

Mules in this country had become conscientious objectors.

There’s no glory or holy symbolism in dying during warfare.

They were almost at Anwar’s house when the third bomb fell.

This is how our village acquired its own Rambo and Tarzan.

He lies silently and calmly in the hole, waiting for it to be filled in.

She exploded, “So why isn’t she pregnant yet?

Muhammad had returned from the dead, resurrected from the bones that had sunk in the well.

The explosion had sent me flying through the air.

“It’s the spirits, girl, it’s the spirits.”

The murmuring on the far side of the barrio was neverending as the heavy machinery demolished homes.

I cross bridges just as I leave dreams in hotels.

The dog, as if she knew they were talking about her, opened her eyes and looked at her owner, who choked back a sob.

I asked my best friend, the black stone wall, about the latest news in our house.

He stabbed him forty-eight times, all over his body, methodical, thorough, conscientious.

“Now let’s get down to us,” she said, lowering her voice to a purr.

I don’t know where Mother would go off to. I’m not sure.

Was there still a second floor? Don’t think about it.

You needed a guide, one of those men who lived off the flesh and blood of the camp.

He can clearly see all of this life of seventy-three years, two months and thirteen days.

The things he could mend! From jewelry to shoe soles, from punctured tires to bent bicycle spokes–he fixed it all.

If fornication was stopped, what pleasure was left in life?

Do I feel remorse? Of course not.

I don’t enjoy popping anybody, but it's my job.

“If you don’t go home, there’ll be bloodshed.”

It is good to kill in spring.

Aficionados of morbid details, you will be asking yourselves what method I used.

My two homies from Africa spent the whole damn day lying in bed or drinking mate in the fountained patio of the house.

The spurting blood only excited him more.

I was surprised when he was the first one who came and tried to blackmail me.

Ever since I was much younger, my mom had often dragged men into her bedroom.