“Edda danced in the ballet. That was her job. 'Job' was not the word other people chose to describe what Edda did, but the right word nonetheless. Words were queer that way, Edda often thought. They classified things. In her case they could place someone in another dimension.”

“Words were not just words, describing things a person could see. Even if most did not. Maybe they had to know a thing first, to see it.”

“She was fascinated with words. To her, words were things of beauty, each like a magical powder or potion that could be combined with other words to create powerful spells.”

“A kind of annihilation, was what Serena called their coupling, and though Pemberton would never have thought to describe it that way, he knew her words had named the thing exactly.”

“This is surely the most significant of the elements that Tolkien brought to fantasy.... his arranged marriage between the Elder Edda and "The Wind in the Willows"--big Icelandic romance and small-scale, cozy English children's book. The story told by "The Lord of the Rings" is essentially what would happen if Mole and Ratty got drafted into the Nibelungenlied.”

“They would ask people to dosomething that is wrong? I thought angels were...” She stumbled, trying tothink of a word to describe her preconceived notion. “Angelic," Jaycie Lerner”