It can be hard to write a skillfully entertaining fiction, but a great book wants to be more, and wants more from us.

There was some sadness in how that could happen, falling out of love with something that had shaped you. Or even people who had.

Ice is for death and endings.

By things so achingly small are lives measured and marred.

most hated by the dark, for their name is light.

Fantasy is, at its best, the purest access to storytelling that we have. It universalizes a tale, it evokes wonder and timeless narrative power, it touches upon inner journeys, it illuminates our collective and individual pasts, throws a focus beam on the present day, and presages the dangers and promises of the future.

I have always argued, in a good novel, interesting things happen to interesting people.