“His green eyes sparkled. 'I think you're the first girl I've ever met who would rather slay a twelve foot snake than face one teeny, tiny spider.''Spiders are scarier,' she murmured, staring ahead.”

“It must make you feel nice and young to say that being a man means nothing and being a woman means nothing and what matters is being a...person. How about being a spider, Gwyn. Let's imagine you're a spider. You're a spider, and you've just had your first serious date. You're limping away from that now, and you're looking over your shoulder, and there's your girlfriend, eating one of your legs like a chicken drumstick. What would you say? I know. You'd say: I find I never think in terms of male spiders or in terms of female spiders. I find I always think in terms of...spiders”

“I put my fingers around the unmarked ring of the spyglass and twisted. The scene became clear. Oh no! A hairy brown spider clung to a vine! I couldn't go there!I'd go to the desert to find a dragon. I began to reset the spyglass, but then I stopped myself. A spider was worse than a dragon?No.My first monsters would be spiders, then.”

“Well, they set spiders and snakes on me for a bit and blew me up and there was this really scary cake, but it’s mostly all right now, I think. Except I don’t ever want any more cake. Look!”

“Who's got a mirror?” I ask. Spider shrugs at me. “We're all fellas. Why would any of us have mirrors?”“I've got a mirror!” Brandon declares happily, digging a compact out of his pocket. No-one is surprised.”

“I caught a glimpse of him thinking of the final combat in the movies, Harry versus Voldemort, Spider-Man versus the Green Goblin.”