As a child there's a horror in discovering the limitations of the ones you love. The time you find that your mother cannot keep you safe, that your tutor makes a mistake, that the wrong path must be taken because the grown-ups lack the strength to take the right one...each of those moments is the theft of your childhood, each of them a blow that kills some part of the child you were, leaving another part of the man exposed, a new creature, tougher but tempered with bitterness and disappointment.

There is no sound more annoying than the chatter of a child, and none more sad than the silence they leave when they are gone.

Confusing the author and the character seems to be a popular and rather unsophisticated reaction to books.

It was a defeat, resorting to crude threats in a game of subtlety, but sometimes one must sacrifice a battle to win the war.

I've always felt that the placement of a man's testicles is an eloquent argument against intelligent design.

I like mountains, always have done. Big obstinate bits of rock sticking up where they're not wanted and getting in folk's way. Great. Climbing them is a different matter altogether though. I hate that.

It never pays to walk blindly. Especially not in your own castle where familiarity hides so much - even when we have the eyes to see.