I could just barely see the dark curve of his shoulder, and something about the shape it made, the gesture it suggested, filled me with a sort of fierce, awful affection.

I felt like I was watching the transfomation of two people: Victor to wolf, and Cole to someone else. I was the only one here, staying the same.

Gansey turned the key. The engine turned over once, paused for the briefest of moments - and then roared to deafening life. The Camaro lived to fight another day. The radio was even working, playing the Stevie Nicks song that always sounded to Gansey like it was about a one-winged dove.

We are shoulder to shoulder due to the size of the cab, and if Gratton is made of flour and potatoes, Sean is made of stone and driftwood and possibly those prickly anemones that sometimes wash up on shore.

I wish you could be kissed, Jane,' he said. 'Because I would beg just one off you. Under all this.' He flailed an arm toward the stars.

Boys,' she says, 'just aren't very good at being afraid.

The biggest mistake you can make is assuming that creativity will hit you all at once and the muse will carry you to the end of the book on feather wings while Foster the People plays gently in the background. Storytelling is work. Pleasurable work, usually, but it is work.