“She loved the smell of books, the feel of books, the look of them on the shelf.”

“Who are we really? Combinations of common chemicals that perform mechanical actions for a few years before crumbling back into the original components? Fresh new souls, drawn at random for some celestial cupboard where God keeps an unending supply?Or the same soul, immortal and eternal, refurbished and reused through endless lives, by that thrifty Housekeeper? In Her wisdom and benevolence She wipes off the memory slates, as part of the cleaning process, because if we could remember all the things we have experienced in earlier lives, we might object to risking it again.”

“Bruce ate a mouthful of eggs and meditated. 'I wonder how many of the great heroes of history would turn out to be a slow runner, if you ever investigated the circumstances.”

“... I [glanced] at his soldiers with a curling lip. I had learned this gesture from watching Stefano. Apparently it was just as annoying on my face....”

“Hold a book in your hand and you're a pilgrim at the gates of a new city.”

“You have some lovely books," she said. "I like the one with the pictures of polar bears.""The books with words too tricky?"She released a strangled laugh."Would you care to explain the system?" Turner stared at the shelves.Matty moved in front of him and pointed. "They're sorted by color.""Ah." Dear God."And by size.""Mmm." Turner felt his mouth start to twitch. "It didn't occur to you to shelve them alphabetically by author name or even title?""Well, yes, but no.""The thing is, you have so many. I organized one boxful only to find the next box wrecked what I'd done so I thought they'd look nicer if all the same color spines sat together. I tried to follow the colors of the spectrum. Look, the books go up and down in waves."He'd noticed. It made him feel seasick.”

“Most of my books are set in the American Midwest, where I have always lived. Midwesterners are lovely, down-to-earth people. The luxury of choosing this region as a setting is the endless supply of seasonal change images that accompany it; in addition to, the wide variety of settings, urban and rural, to choose from.”