“So I had this problem -- work or starve. So I thought I'd combine the two and decided to become a writer.”

“Forget the past, let the dead bury the dead. Things were working out fine, and that was the only thing he had to remember.”

“I haven't had this much fun since the rats ate my baby sister”

“Magic--that's just a label, you know. Completely meaningless. It wasn't so very long ago that people were saying that electricity was magic.”

“The man who smiles when things go wrong has thought of someone to blame it on.”

“Then she did see it there - just a face, peering through the curtains, hanging in midair like a mask. A head-scarf concealed the hair and the glassy eyes stared inhumanly, but it wasn’t a mask, it couldn’t be. The skin had been powdered dead-white and two hectic spots of rouge centered on the cheekbones. It wasn’t a mask. It was the face of a crazy old woman. Mary started to scream, and then the curtains parted further and a hand appeared, holding a butcher’s knife. It was the knife that, a moment later, cut off her scream.And her head.”

“Despite my ghoulish reputation, I really have the heart of a small boy. I keep it in a jar on my desk.”