Can't you just keep your big mouth shut?" Brian said furiously to Nan. He pointed to Chrestomanci. "How do we know he's safe? For all we know, he could be the devil that you summoned up!" "Oh, you flatter me, Brian," Chrestomanci said.

He scarcely saw his parents. When Christopher was small, he was terrified that he would meet Papa out walking in the Park one day and not recognize him.

Christopher discovered that you dealt with obnoxious masters and most older boys the way you dealt with governesses: you quite politely told them the truth in the way they wanted to hear it, so that they thought they had won and left you in peace.

Alas, poor Yorick!" he said. "She heard mermaids, so it follows that there is something rotten in the state of Denmark. I have caught an everlasting cold, but luckily I am terribly dishonest. I cling to that.

I've often noticed" Fiona said, "that when people say, 'This can't happen in this day and age', they say it because it is happening.

Goats," said Maxwell Hyde, "are a special case. Mad as hatters, all of them.

Happiness isn't a thing. You can't go out and get it like a cup of tea. It's the way you feel about things.