“For years I felt that being respectable meant maintaining a sinister complacency, and the disreputable freedom I sought helped make me a writer.”

“We’d spent years as adversaries, two predators sharing territory and a certain, unwelcome attraction. Somehow, during all those years I spent outwardly acquiescing to his demands while making sure I held my own, I’d won his respect. I’d had werewolves love me and hate me, but I’d never had one respect me before. Not even Samuel. Adam respected me enough to act on my suspicions. It meant a lot.”

“Mother used to say it meant Christopher was a nice name because it was a story about being kind and helpful, but I do not want my name to mean a story about being kind and helpful. I want my name to mean me.”

“Writers may be disreputable, incorrigible, early to decay or late to bloom but they dare to go it alone”

“I finally know the difference between pleasing and loving, obeying and respecting. It has taken me so many years to be okay with being different, and with being this alive, this intense. (xxvi)”

“I am what I am.........both as a result of people who respected me and helped me, and of those who did not respect me and treated me badly.Nelson Mandela”