Young people believe that regret is something you will never feel if you simply do as you please, but sometimes it is a matter of degree.

Everything we knew condemned us, and our questioning condemned us most of all. Knowledge was the way of our people, and knowledge was dangerous. It was the first thing that freed you and the thing that put you in peril. It was the key to the ten gates. I saw them clearly now, each and every one, the gates that were there for me. Ashes, Bones, Grass, Heart, Stone, Love, Sorrow, Blood, Earth, Sky.

When I write for teens, I feel I can cut through everything and get to the bare bones. I can get straight into the emotional world of the character.

[Fairy tales] are like a journey to the woods and the many ways you can get lost. Some people say it's not a good idea to read fairy tales to anyone under the age of eight because they are brutal and raw. When I was a kid I often felt that kids's books were speaking down to me, but I never felt that way about fairy tales. They are bloody and scary, but so is life.

It was the sort of beauty you feel so deeply it becomes contagious and somehow makes you feel beautiful too.

I wasn't good company, that was true, and people avoided me, but that was all right. I was too busy dreaming.

Be careful what you wish for. I know that for a fact. Wishes are brutal, unforgiving things. They burn your tongue the moment they're spoken and you can never take them back.