Things that try to look like things often do look more like things than things.

I’ve seen excitement, and I’ve seen boredom. And boredom was best.

It is a mistake trying to cheer up camels. You may as well drop meringues into a black hole.

Sometimes words need music too. Sometimes the descriptions are not enough. Books should be written with soundtracks, like films.

They may be called the Palace Guard, the City Guard, or the Patrol. Whatever the name, their purpose in any work of heroic fantasy is identical: it is, round about Chapter Three (or ten minutes into the film) to rush into the room, attack the hero one at a time, and be slaughtered. No one ever asks them if they want to. This book is dedicated to those fine men.

What did they feed the lions and tigers with in the ark, sir?

You have the effrontery to be squeamish, it thought at him. But we were dragons. We were supposed to be cruel, cunning, heartless and terrible. But this much I can tell you, you ape – the great face pressed even closer, so that Wonse was staring into the pitiless depths of his eyes – we never burned and tortured and ripped one another apart and called it morality.