“I don't know much more than I did when I was alive. Most of the stuff I know now that I didn't know then I can't put into words.”

“I don't know. I had to be something, didn't I?”

“How do I know you'll keep your word?" asked Coraline."I swear it," said the other mother. "I swear it on my own mother's grave.""Does she have a grave?" asked Coraline."Oh yes," said the other mother. "I put her in there myself. And when I found her trying to crawl out, I put her back.”

“How old are you?" said the girl. "What are you doing here? Do you live here? What's your name?" "I don't know," said Bod. "You don't know your name?" said the girl. "Course you do. Everybody knows their own name. Fibber." "I know my name," said Bod. "And I know what I'm doing here. But I don't know the other things you said.”

“I'm a mother," said her mother, in her foodless flat where the dust did not dare to settle, "and I know what I know.”

“Do you know why dead people only go out at night, puppy? Because it's easier to pass for real, in the dark. And I don't want to have to pass. I want to be alive.”

“Laura looked up at him with dead blue eyes. I want to be alive again," she said. "Not in this half-life. I want to be really alive. I want to feel my heart pumping in my chest again. I want to feel blood moving through me — hot, and salty, and real. It's weird, you don't think you can feel it, the blood, but believe me, when it stops flowing, you'll know." She rubbed her eyes, smudging her face with red from the mess on her hands. Look, it's hard. You know why dead people only go out at night, puppy? Because it's easier to pass for real, in the dark. And I don't want to have to pass. I want to be alive.”