“I'd been to the island on most weekends up until I got shot, and Thomas had often come with me. We'd used some fresh lumber, some material salvaged from the ruined town, and some pontoons made from plastic sheathing and old tractor-tire inner tubes to construct a floating walkway to serve as a dock, anchored to the old pilings that had once supported a much larger structure. Upon completion, I had dubbed it the Whatsup Dock, and Thomas had chucked me twenty feet out into the lake, thus proving his utter lack of appreciation for reference-orientated humour. (And then I'd thrown him forty feet out with magic, once I got dry. Because come on, he's my brother. It was the only thing to do.)”

“That night after my parents had kissed me good night and closed my door, I got out of bed and took from my shirt pocket the three seeds I had carried since we left the ant kingdom. Everything else I'd gathered, I realized, had been either given away or given back. Way back on my closet shelf was a tiny woven Indian basket with a cover. My grandfather had given me this when I was only nine years old, but it had always held some sort of secret for me. Into this basket I put the seeds, and hid it again."We'll use them," I told Scuro as I got back into bed. "Just wait. We'll use them."He sighed and rearranged himself on his rug in the corner. I noticed then that the kitten-a shy little creature only recently come to our household and up till now afraid of everything including Scuro-was curled between Scuro's paws, purring in its sleep.”

“I once received a letter from an old lady in California who informed me that when the tired reader comes home at night, he wishes to read something that will lift up his heart. And it seems her heart had not been lifted up by anything of mine she had read. I think that if her heart had been in the right place, it would have been lifted up.”

“A man inherited a field in which was an accumulation of old stone, part of an older hall. Of the old stone some had already been used in building the house in which he actually lived, not far from the old house of his fathers. Of the rest he took some and built a tower. But his friends coming perceived at once (without troubling to climb the steps) that these stones had formerly belonged to a more ancient building. So they pushed the tower over, with no little labour, and in order to look for hidden carvings and inscriptions, or to discover whence the man's distant forefathers had obtained their building material. Some suspecting a deposit of coal under the soil began to dig for it, and forgot even the stones. They all said: 'This tower is most interesting.' But they also said (after pushing it over): 'What a muddle it is in!' And even the man's own descendants, who might have been expected to consider what he had been about, were heard to murmur: 'He is such an odd fellow! Imagine using these old stones just to build a nonsensical tower! Why did not he restore the old house? he had no sense of proportion.' But from the top of that tower the man had been able to look out upon the sea.”

“I was sad because I had no shoes, until I met a man who had no feet. So I said, "Got any shoes you’re not using?”

“And wonders of wonders, they both shut up and did as I said. If I'd had time I would have pulled out my journal and made a note: Shame and Terric actually listened to me for once. Warn Hell. There's a freeze coming.”