“I thought murdered people wanted justice,” I said.

“Haunting is a form of justice,” said Rose. “Plus, when you know who murdered you, you can spend decades getting ready for them to kick the bucket and come into slapping range. It’s like waiting for Christmas. You always know there’s going to be a delicious gift box of throat punching on the other end.”

A good dog was sky-buried with as much honor as a good horse.

Like ghosts, words are disembodied presences. Therefore, in some senses, talking about ghosts in literature is as hopeless (and perhaps also as important) as talking about words in literature, or ideas in literature. All stories are ghost stories, if only because each word, each random collection of syllables, is intended to conjure forth an unreal reality, to embody and animate a strange imaginary entity that is both there and not there, actual and not actual. Writers try to capture ghosts out of their own experience, snaring them in print so as to release them into readers' minds - or better yet, into the dark corners of readers' bedrooms.

You know, sometimes people say to me, ‘Why do you choose to write that creepy stuff?’ And I usually say, ‘What makes you think I have a choice?’