It is good for children to find themselves facing the elements of a fairy tale - they are well-equipped to deal with these

Richard did not believe in angels, he never had. He was damned if he was going to start now. Still, it was much easier not to believe in something when it was not actually looking directly at you and saying your name.

He had gone beyond the world of metaphor and simile into the place of things that are, and it was changing him.

She didn't have a daddy?" I asked. "No." "Did you have a daddy?" "You're all questions, aren't you? No, love. We never went in for that sort of thing. You only need men if you want to breed more men.

Some of the things are the same no matter which world you're in, kid. One of 'em is this: The quickest way out of something is usually straight through it.

The thin girl was gulping down one of Richard's bananas in what was, Richard reflected, the least erotic display of banana-eating he had ever seen.

There's a glorious sense of freedom in comedy, just allowing myself to tell jokes, allowing myself to interrupt myself and tell old African folk stories that I made up - or didn't - and Jamaican stories.