I envisioned huge piles of the Elf Hotel flying off the belt, taking down everybody in sight. I had seen pictures of that Elf Hotel - it had sharp candy-cane spires that could easily impale someone. If anyone was ever going to be killed by an Elf Hotel, it would be my parents.

Some nutter's gone and pulled a Jack the Ripper.

Even though she had been warned, she tripped over the bike. She probably tripped because she'd been warned and was telling herself not to trip over the bike. She did that sometimes. It was often easier not to know what obstacles were in the way.

You're...a demon hunter?' 'It's not as exciting as it sounds,' he said. 'There is a surprising amount of paperwork involved.

Top Trumps appeared to be a game in which you got cards, and the cards had a picture (in this case, of a horse), and told you all kinds of stats for that horse, how fast it was, how big it was, etc. Whoever had the better horse won both the cards. You repeated this until someone had all the cards. So, basically it was exactly like high school, except it only took three minutes. Which was really a bit more humane, if you thought about it.

We're going to die," Keith said, the moment he was gone. "This man is a serial killer. We're going to die, and he's going to bury us in his garden and build a shed on us.

Nothing was quite like it was supposed to be.