Excerpt from "Once a Runner"

Props to Bill for his post on the merits of this fine novel which prompted me to pick it up again. I had read the excerpt from "The Runners Literary Companion" but I didn't really get the section they had chosen to highlight. Looking at it now from the beginning, it really is a thoughtfully crafted story and well worth the free time of anyone who's ever run. An excerpt:

"Quenton Cassidy was six foot two, his meager 167 pounds stretched across his frame in the manner dictated by the searing daily necessities of his special task. Beneath the tight skin, a smooth musculature glided with fluid ease, giving the impression of elastic, lightweight power: a featherless view of a young falcon.
There were no inefficient corners or bulges; the form was sharply chiseled as if from sand worn driftwood, fluted with oblique angles and long, tapering ridges, thin products of his care. Even now, as he stood perfectly still in the early morning glow, inverted tear drop thighs and high bunched calves suggested only motion: smooth effortless speed.
Stretching with a lovely kind of pain, he turned from the window and sat again on the edge of the rumpled bed to put on his worn Adidas Gazelle training shoes, and was out the door and gone.
Quenton Cassidy was a miler."