“Some of the things are the same no matter which world you're in, kid. One of 'em is this: The quickest way out of something is usually straight through it.”

“The quickest way is sometimes the longest.”

“He goes his way. We travel a spiral. The quickest way is sometimes the longest.”

“Fiction does something unique in that it takes us out of our heads and puts us into other people's heads. And I think reading, and experiencing fiction through reading, is something that gives us empathy. And that, I think, is vital. It takes us out of our lives. Without reading, you're stuck with one life. Reading gives you more than one life. It gives you an infinite number of lives, which I think is wonderful. Or at least, not infinite, but as many as there are books on the shelves.”

“Making fiction for children, making books for children, isn't something you do for money. It's something you do because what children read and learn and see and take in changes them and forms them, and they make the future. They make the world we're going to wind up in, the world that will be here when we're gone. Which sounds preachy (and is more than you need for a quotebyte) but it's true. I want to tell kids important things, and I want them to love stories and love reading and love finding things out. I want them to be brave and wise. So I write for them.”

“She's not talking now," muttered the Rani's aunt, wagging one stick-like finger. "That tiger is throwing his voice.""Can no-one get that woman to stop talking?" asked the Rajah of the room."Easier to stop 'em than start 'em," said the tiger, and he dealt with the matter.”

“I was the kind of kid whose parents would drop him off at the local town library on their way to work, and I'd go and work my way through the children's area.”