“Dare to imagine and believe in the magic of possibilities!”

“Mom wouldn't approve of taffy for breakfast, magic word or no magic word, but Gramma Dee is different that way. A lot of grammas are.”

“A few hundred years ago there were no differences between magic and medicine.”

“Voglio dare, voglio fare felici le persone, di certo non può far male.”

“He drank, for the same reason he wrote second-rate science fiction. Not to forget but to remember, to open the past and find himself there again. He opened each bottle, began each story with the secret conviction that here was the magic drought that would restore him. But magic, like wine, needs the right conditions in order to work.”

“The right circumstances sometimes happen of their own accord, slyly, without fanfare, without warning. Layman's alchemy. . . . The magic of everyday things.”

“Nat Parson says it's the devil's mark.""Nat Parson's a gobshite."Maddy was torn between a natural feeling of sacrilege and a deep admiration of anyone who dared call a parson 'gobshite.”