Good and evil are a great deal more complex than a princess and a dragon . . . is not the dragon the hero of his own story?

Widge can see the past." Poppet says suddenly. "That's why his stories are so good." "The past is easier," Widget says. "It's already there." "In the stars?" Bailey asks. "No." Widget says. "On people. The past stays on you the way powdered sugar stays on fingers. Some people can get rid of it but it's still there, the events and t hings that pushed you to where you are now.

I find I think of myself not as a writer so much as someone who provides a gateway, a tangential route for readers to reach the circus. To visit the circus again, if only in their minds, when they are unable to attend it physically. I relay it through printed words on crumpled newsprint, words that they can read again and again, returning to the circus whenever they wish, regardless of time of day or physical location. Transporting them at will. When put that way, it sounds rather like magic, doesn't it? p.369

I mean only that I hope they find darkness or paradise without fear of it, if they can.

I'm kind of big on performance in general. I like the sort of entertainment where you can go in and be fully immersed in it.

So it’s really best to keep your secrets when you have them, for their own good, as well as yours.

He forgets that he was someone's dream once, himself.