“What people value in their books—and thus what they count as literature—really tells you more about them than it does about the book.”

“The truth is, everyone likes to look down on someone. If your favorites are all avant-garde writers who throw in Sanskrit and German, you can look down on everyone. If your favorites are all Oprah Book Club books, you can at least look down on mystery readers. Mystery readers have sci-fi readers. Sci-fi can look down on fantasy. And yes, fantasy readers have their own snobbishness. I’ll bet this, though: in a hundred years, people will be writing a lot more dissertations on Harry Potter than on John Updike. Look, Charles Dickens wrote popular fiction. Shakespeare wrote popular fiction—until he wrote his sonnets, desperate to show the literati of his day that he was real artist. Edgar Allan Poe tied himself in knots because no one realized he was a genius. The core of the problem is how we want to define “literature”. The Latin root simply means “letters”. Those letters are either delivered—they connect with an audience—or they don’t. For some, that audience is a few thousand college professors and some critics. For others, its twenty million women desperate for romance in their lives. Those connections happen because the books successfully communicate something real about the human experience. Sure, there are trashy books that do really well, but that’s because there are trashy facets of humanity. What people value in their books—and thus what they count as literature—really tells you more about them than it does about the book.”

“At some point, you have to decide not merely what you're going to believe, but how you're going to believe. Are you going to believe in people, or in ideas or in Orcholam? With your heart, or with your head? Will you believe what's in front of you, or in what you think you know? There are some things you think you know that are lies. I can't tell you what those are, and I'm sorry for that.”

“...if reality is hard and flat and unjust, then it's better to adjust to what really is than to complain that it isn't what you wish. That was what made me lose faith..... But having lost it, soon I doubted my lack of faith. There were niggling hints of meaning everywhere.”

“If I tell you a secret can you keep it quiet?“Well, I can. I’m not so sure about Doll Girl.”

“Elene gasped and sat up. "Kylar Thaddeus Stern!"Kylar giggled. "Thaddeus? That's a good one. I knew a Thaddeus once.""So did I. He was a blind idiot.""Really?" Kylar said, his eyes dancing. "The one I knew was famous for his gigantic-""Kylar!" Elene interrupted, motioning toward Uly."His gigantic what?" Uly asked."Now you did it." Elene said, "His gigantic what, Kyler?""Feet. And you know what they say about big feet." He winked lasciviously at Elene."What?" Uly asked."Big Shoes," Kylar said.”

“Why do you keep saying incarnations like I’m some kind of god?” It wasn’t a great question, but the real questions were so big that Kylar didn’t even know how ask them. “You are worshipped in a few remote areas where your master wasn’t very careful about showing the full extent of his powers.” “What?!”