Participating in Society in not a thing one can do naturally; one has to rehearse for it.

But miracles are not for the asking; they come only when the stern eyes of God droop shut for a moment, and Our Lady takes advantage of His inattention to grant an illicit mercy. God...is an Anglican, whereas Our Lady is of the True Faith; the two of Them have an uneasy relationship, unable to agree on anything, except that if They divorce, the Devil will leap gleefully into the breach.

Most distracting of all, though, was not the threat of danger but the allure of beauty.

Of course I know that the twins are only words on a page, and I'm certainly not the sort of writer who talks to his characters or harbours any illusions about the creative process. But at the same time, I think it's juvenile and arrogant when literary writers compulsively remind their readers that the characters aren't real. People know that already. The challenge is to make an intelligent reader suspend disbelief, to seduce them into the reality of a narrative.

Most true things are kind of corny, don’t you think? But we make them more sophisticated out of sheer embarrassment.

History indulges strange whims in the way it dresses its women.

Watch your step. Keep your wits about you; you will need them.