""Once you let people know anything about what you think, that's it, you're dead. Then they'll be jumping about in your mind, taking things out, holding them up to the light and killing them, yes, killing them, because thoughts are supposed to stay and grow in quiet, dark places, like butterflies in cocoons”. (Page 82)"

""Maybe Jessamy has all these 'attacks' because she can't make up her mind whether she's black or white!" (Chapter 2, Page 13)"

""Who is this woman who has a Nigerian maiden name in a British passport, who stands here wearing denim shorts and a strappy yellow top, with a white man and a half-and-half child?" (Chapter 2, Page 12)"

""Wuraola sounded like another person. Not her at all. Should she answer to this name, and by doing so steal the identity of someone who belonged here?” (Part 1, Chapter 4, Page 28)"

""In Nigeria, her mother had said, children were always getting themselves into mischief, and surely that was better than sitting inside reading and staring into space all day.” (Part 1, Chapter 3, Page 21)"

""England, where people who stared at you would shift their eyes away with an embarrassed, smiling gesture if you stared back. England, where people didn’t see you, where it was almost rude to, wrong to.” (Page 16)"

""He was looking at her, but in a distracted manner, as if she was something to look at while he waited for something else.”(Page 15)"

""well, out of place. His face was wet with perspiration and flushed pink, and even the way that he stood marked him out as different." (Chapter 1, Page 9)"

""It was Nigeria. That was the problem. Nigeria felt ugly." (Part 1, Chapter 1, Page 6)"

""Words describing white people, white things, every single story spun out in some place where WE don’t exist! It has no value; in my eyes, it is to confuse.”"

"Sleeping Beauty is not herself, and doesn’t become so until the isolation of her hundred-year sleep, during which she must dream her own dreams. Carabosse’s curse is the most meaningful gift the girl could have been given."

"Without further ado I give you my number one [anti-heroine]: Carabosse, the fairy who goes where she is not invited expressly in order to curse a princess whose life was all set up to be a bright and gracious path from birth to death."

"I sometimes consider a story’s anti-heroine to be an embodied protest against the set of ideals the narrative upholds in the form of the perfect heroine."

"An anti-heroine has her own purity, a singleness of intention."

"“She encouraged herself to see her very small presence in the world as a good thing, a power, something that a hero might possess.”"

"“In Narnia a girl might ring a bell in a deserted temple and feel the chime in her eyes, pure as the freeze that forces tears. Then when the sound dies out, the White Witch wakes. It was like, I want to touch you, and I can touch you, now what next, a dagger?”"

"“And she walked away, and she walked away, and that was that, and that was that.”"

"“To you who eat a lot of rice because you are lonely"

"“The general advice is always be yourself, be yourself, which only makes sense if you haven't got an attitude problem.”"

"“... it's not whiteness itself that sets Them against Us, but the worship of whiteness. Same goes if you swap whiteness out for other things-- fancy possessions for sure, pedigree, maybe youth too... we beat Them (and spare ourselves a lot of tedium and terror) by declining to worship.”"

"“I was born, and then I was quietly resentful of that fact for a few years...but then I went to a library and it was okay.”"

"“And without further argument he unsheathed the sword and cleaved Miss Foxe's head from her neck. He knew what was supposed to happen. He knew that this awkward, whispering creature before him should now transform into a princess - dazzlingly beautiful, free, and made wise by her hardship."

"“If you should find yourself in a place that is indifferent to you and there is someone there that your spirit stretches to, then that person is kin.”"

"“I've read that madness is present when everything you see and hear takes on an equal significance. A dead bird makes you cry, and so does a doorknob.”"

"“With boys there was a fundamental assumption that they had a right to be there—not always, but more often than not. With girls, Why her? came up so quickly.”"

"“For reasons of my own I take note of the way people act when they’re around mirrors.”"

"“But then, maybe “I don’t believe in you” is the cruelest way to kill a monster.”"

"“A library at night is full of sounds: the unread books can't stand it any longer and announce their contents, some boasting, some shy, some devious.”"

"“It occurred to me that I was unhappy. And it didn’t feel so very terrible. No urgency, nothing. I could slip out of my life on a slow wave like this—it didn’t matter. I don’t have to be happy. All I have to do is hold on to something and wait.”"

"“That's the ideal meeting...once upon a time, only once, unexpectedly, then never again.”"

"“What you're doing is building a horrible kind of logic. People read what you write and they say, 'Yes, he is talking about things that really happen,' and they keep reading, and it makes sense to them. You're explaining things that can't be defended, and the explanations themselves are mad, just bizarre — but you offer them with such confidence. It was because she kept the chain on the door; it was because he needed to let off steam after a hard day's scraping and bowing at work; it was because she was irritating and stupid; it was because she lied to him, made a fool of him; it was because she had to die, she just had to, it makes dramatic sense; it was because 'nothing is more poetic than the death of a beautiful woman'; it was because of this, it was because of that. It's obscene to make such things reasonable.”"

"“… there’s a difference between having no one because you’ve chosen it and having no one because everyone has been taken away.”"

"“I wish there was someone I could have written to after that, someone I could have written to explain how awful it was to have someone touch you, then look at you properly and change his mind.”"

"“It was the usual struggle between one who loves by accepting burdens and one who loves by refusing to be one.”"

"“The first coffee of the morning is never, ever, ready quickly enough. You die before it’s ready and then your ghost pours the resurrection potion out of the moka pot.”"

"“I’m never sad when a friend goes far away, because whichever city or country that friend goes to, they turn the place friendly. They turn a suspicious-looking name on the map into a place where a welcome can be found. Maybe the friend will talk about you sometimes, to other friends that live around him, and then that’s almost as good as being there yourself. You’re in several places at once! In fact, my daughter, I would even go so far as to say that the further away your friends, and the more spread out they are the better your chances of going safely through the world…”"

"“I know of witches who whistle at different pitches, calling things that don't have names.”"

"“Imagine having a mother who worries that you read too much. The question is, what is it that's supposed to happen to people who read too much? How can you tell when someone's crossed the line.”"

"“Solitary people, these book lovers. I think it's swell that there are people you don't have to worry about when you don't see them for a long time, you don't have to wonder what they do, how they're getting along with themselves. You just know that they're all right, and probably doing something they like.”"

""I think Poe's quite good, actually. The whole casual horror thing. Like someone standing next to you and screaming their head off and you asking them what the fuck and them stopping for a moment to say 'Oh you know, I'm just afraid of Death' and then they keep on with the screaming.”"

"He's awful. He was obviously . . . what's the term . . . 'disappointed in love' at some point. He probably never smiled again. The pages are just bursting with his longing for women to suffer. If he ever met me he'd probably punch me on the nose."

"“What do you think of Poe?""

"“There was . . . a mirror that crawled across the wall in a wooden frame. When I go into Miri's room all I can see, all I can think of is that enormous mirror, like a lake on the wall.”"

"“I almost forgot to mention another fox I know of—a very wicked fox indeed. But you are tired of hearing about foxes now, so I won't go on.”"

"“Have you forgotten about our fox?"

"“Have you ever heard a note in someone's voice that said 'This is the end?' I heard it in the next words he said to me, and I stopped listening.”"

"“Our exchanges always seem to turn into whatever he wants them to.”"

"“I was always weak in the head—that must be it. I can't seem to care anymore about what I'm supposed to do.”"

"“I'm not saying I'm amazing or anything, but I'm decent-looking. Why shouldn't a decent-looking girl expect to be kissed?”"