Once you've ruled out the impossible then whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truth. The problem lay in working out what was impossible, of course. That was the trick, all right. There was also the curious incident of the orangutan in the night-time.

He felt that the darkness was full of unimaginable horrors - and the trouble with unimaginable horrors was that they were only too easy to imagine.

Writing is the most fun you can have by yourself.

Building a temple didn't mean you believed in gods, it just meant you believed in architecture.

He was, he would be the first to admit, a coward, an incompetent, and not even very good at being a failure.

Unseen University was much bigger on the inside. Thousands of years as the leading establishment of practical magic in a world where dimensions were largely a matter of chance in any case had left it bulging in places where it shouldn't have places. There were rooms containing rooms which, if you entered them, turned out to contain the room you'd started with, which can be a problem if you are in a conga line.

Sometimes you can think that 'I've had enough of wizards!' And sometimes fantasy is not just about wizards.