Always remember that the crowd that applauds your coronation is the same crowd that will applaud your beheading. People like a show.

The people who really run organizations are usually found several levels down, where it is still possible to get things done.

I mistrust the term graphic novel because it sounds like a good thing to put on a tee-shirt. That's why the French like them.

Just call in at the torturer on your way out. See when he can fit you in.

Books bend space and time. One reason the owners of those aforesaid little rambling, poky secondhand bookshops always seem slightly unearthly is that many of them really are, having strayed into this world after taking a wrong turning in their own bookshops in worlds where it is considered commendable business practice to wear carpet slippers all the time and open your shop only when you feel like it.

She heard him mutter, 'Can you take away this grief?' 'I'm sorry,' she replied. 'Everyone asks me. And I would not do so even if I knew how. It belongs to you. Only time and tears take away grief; that is what they are for.

Some of them wanted to sell me snake oil and I'm not necessarily going to dismiss all of these, as I have never found a rusty snake.