The world was a terrible place, cruel, pitiless, dark as a bad dream. Not a good place to live. Only in books could you find pity, comfort, happiness - and love. Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you security and friendship and didn't ask anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly.

The night belongs to beasts of prey, and always has. It's easy to forget that when you're indoors, protected by light and solid walls.

There could be few men whose love for a woman had been written on his face with a knife.

My daughter, Anna, is almost 15, and my son, Ben, is almost 10.

a book always keeps something of its owner between its pages.

From the tower battlements, Dustfinger looked down on a lake as black as night, where the reflection of the castle swam in a sea of stars. The wind passing over his unscarred face was cold from the snow of the surrounding mountains, and Dustfinger relished life as if he were tasting it for the first time. The longing it brought, and the desire. All the bitterness, all the sweetness, even if it was only for a while, never for more than a while, everything gained and lost, lost and found again.

A reader doesn't really see the characters in a story; he feels them.