Her days were measured by thirst and hangover.

The pie sat in the kitchen cooling, a beacon for the entire family.

All was forgiven in that moment as Owen stood in the doorway, suitcases by his side.

They tumbled towards the river in a cartoon-like jumble of swinging legs, arms and fists, kicking up dirt the whole way down.

From his barred window Bart could see the scaffold nearing completion.

A low moan escaped Moreen's lips.

In memoriam CCA 1932-2012

"Like Tolstoy I prefer to limit my interaction with the fairer sex," the author sniffed, giving Rachel a disdainful glance.

Like a parasitic worm growing in its host's belly, Tokyo was about to discover that Akio, over the course of the last two years, had centralized his control of the city's underworld and was quickly making inroads into legitimate enterprises.

With three failed marriages and a string of dud dates Ralph began to think of himself as an orphan of love.

After 40 years of practicing law he was world-weary, jaded, worn out, but the idea of quitting made him physically ill as he pictured himself in Bermuda shorts and sunglasses knocking tennis or golf balls around.

  She exposed her soul to him but found no recompense.

"Let the talking heads waggle their fingers at me because I just don't care anymore," said the governor, swilling straight from a bourbon bottle.

Being new to the country Katya didn't understand the subtleties of etiquette and would often step on others' toes, both in the literal and figurative sense.

We bolted the door to keep the wolves at bay.

They stirred the fear, added a dash of racism and a cupful of saber rattling and created the perfect despotic state.

She came traipsing through the parlor with an axe hidden behind her back.

The road was hot and gummy on his bare feet.

It was a bitter, rust belt life they inherited.

The survival of democracy was at stake, in his opinion, but then Stark felt that way about pretty much any political dealings he didn't agree with.

The councilor blamed a conciliatory constabulary on a lack of driving citations, the fees of which were the town's bread-and-butter.

Plunderers they were, pirates of finance who received no greater pleasure than to watch the little guys walk the plank.

From Potsdam to Paducah the pop star's latest haircut was all that was discussed, pushing the other news (food shortages, war, government corruption) to the periphery.

The newspaper was the town's whipping boy, accused of being too liberal by the conservatives and too conservative by the liberals.

When Tony heard the words of the prosecutor he thought the man was talking about someone else.

They passed themselves off as royalty, but they were in fact infamous swindlers from San Francisco who had left hundreds of wide-eyed rubes broke.

Lydia read and reread the telegram, her mind unable to comprehend the devastating news.

The gap between her front teeth provided the perfect launching pad for the copious streams of spittle with which she would kill flies, annoy the pets and once even managed to knock the cigarette out of her father's mouth at 50 paces.

The remnants of the sign clung to the storefront window, a ghost of better days.

Some nights Rob would wake up screaming, visions of  Birkinstocks and incense, tie-dye and patchouli swirling in his head, nightmares from his time as a Berkley campus cop.