For while agents and editors often misunderstand their market and sometimes reject good or even great works, they do prevent a vast quantity of truly execrable writing from being published.

Perfect love was that kind of love that made no sense but made everything else make sense somehow. It was raw and unscripted, turbulent and slightly unpredictable.

A faint smell of lilac filled the air. There was always lilac in this part of town. Where there were grandmothers, there was always lilac.

For while agents and editors often misunderstand their market and sometimes reject good or even great works, they do prevent a vast quantity of truly execrable writing from being published.

Nonfiction brought me back to earth and sobered me up whenever it seemed like I'd become too drunk on the lives and loves of imaginary people, but that doesn't mean it was any less thrilling or transporting, although it was often more illuminating.

Do the children who prefer books set in the real, ordinary, workaday world ever read as obsessively as those who would much rather be transported into other worlds entirely?

If we weigh the significance of a book by the effect it has on its readers, then the great children's books suddenly turn up very high on the list.