Come on, say it again. I'm a perfect devil. Tell me how bad I am. It makes me feel so good!

Let tears gather in your eyes. You haven’t tears enough for what you’ve done to me. Six more mortal years, seven, eight…I might have had that shape!’ Her pointed finger flew at Madeleine, whose hands had risen to her face, whose eyes were clouded over. Her moan was almost Claudia’s name. But Claudia did not hear her. ‘Yes, that shape, I might have known what it was to walk at your side.

First-person narrators is the way I know how to write a book with the greatest power and chance of artistic success.

I claim Dickens as a mentor. He's my teacher. He's one of my driving forces.

I’d thought I knew what beauty was in women; but she’d surpassed all the language I had for it.

He had grieved for me, I'll give him that much. But then he is so good at grieving! He wears woe as others wear velvet; sorrow flatters him like the light of candles; tears become him like jewels.

A perfectly evil Devil makes even less sense than a perfect God.