Why did I walk so purposefully in a straight line? Where would it take me? He went round and round and we got there all the same.

Always in my books, I like to throw that rogue element into a stable situation and then see what happens.

Names are still magic; even Sharon, Karen, Darren, and Warren are magic to somebody somewhere. In fairy stories, naming is knowledge. When I know your name, I can call your name, and when I call your name, you'll come to me.

Happiness is a specific. Misery is a generalization. People usually know exactly why they are happy. They very rarely know why they are miserable.

For fate may hang on any moment and at any moment be changed.

The ancients believed in fate because they recognized how hard it is for anyone to change anything. The pull of past and future is so strong that the present is crushed by it. We lie helpless in the force of patterns inherited and patterns re-enacted by our own behavior. The burden is intolerable.

Nothing has an unlikely quality. It is heavy.