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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
T.J. Klune
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July 4 - August 17, 2025
“I know you got it in your head at some point that you’re funny. And you are, but now is not the time for humor. Now is the time for panicking.”
“But,” Chauncey said, “I just don’t get it. All I want to do is help. I can’t control how I look. It’s not my fault I’m—” “Handsome as crap?” Phee said.
“I’m not a monster,” Chauncey said. “Nope,” Phee said. “You’re Chauncey. The best Chauncey I’ve ever known.” “And I’m handsome as crap.” “Hell yes.”
“And I can eat all the pine cones I want because they’re not human.” “Except it probably won’t feel good when you have to poop.” “All my poops feel good, so no worries there!”
“I just remembered that I needed to talk to Arthur and Linus about stuff! And things!” “Name two,” Linus said, folding his arms. “Potatoes and Portugal,” Chauncey said promptly. “What about them?” Arthur asked. “I have absolutely no idea,” Chauncey said. He deflated. “Sorry, Phee. I did my best.”
“I accidentally reversed gravity when I was trying to measure butter.” “Oh,” Chauncey said. “That makes sense. I bet that happens to a lot of people because cooking is hard.”
“This is what happens when you sleep late,” Linus muttered. “Just when you think you’re getting extra rest, someone breathes fire.”
“What if something happens and I have to be evil and take over the world?”
Lucy rolled his eyes. “I know where to get real blood, but Arthur said I’m not allowed to do that anymore.” “I did,” Arthur said simply.
“So many people want to eat my food,” Lucy said in awe. “This must be what it feels like to be God. Fun fact! Some people go to church and ritually eat Jesus and drink his blood. Isn’t that interesting?”
“Because violence is never the answer,” Arthur said. Talia smiled sweetly. “But it can be the question.”
I believe the greatest weapon we have at our disposal is our voices. And I am going to use my voice for you, and for me. Hate is loud. We are louder.”
“I don’t have a penis,” Chauncey said. “It’s more like a cloaca.” “What’s that?” Phee asked. “Oh! It’s this thing where—” “I don’t know that we need to talk about our genitals at the table where we eat,” Linus said. “I don’t mind,” Chauncey said. “I like my body. It’s squishy.”
See me. See me for who I am. I am magic. I am human. I am inhuman. See me. I am a boy. I am a girl. I am everything and nothing in between. See me. You do. You see me. You recoil in fear. You scream in anger. See me. I bleed. I ache. You see me, and you wish you hadn’t. You wish I was invisible. Out of sight, out of mind. Unseen, faded, muted. You want my color. You want my joy. You want a monochrome world with monochrome beliefs. You see me, and you want to take it all away. But you can’t. You want me lost, but I am found in the breaths I take, in the spaces between heartbeats. I am found
...more
“Oh no. Are you going senile again? I knew forty-one in human years was old as crap. We’ll have to put him into a home where we’ll promise to visit but then we don’t.”
when I lived in the city, I dreamed in color, of places where the sea stretched on for miles and miles.” He looked at each of the children in turn. “But what I didn’t expect was that the color didn’t come from the ocean, or the trees, or even the island itself. It came from all of you.”
I worry all the time about the children. I worry about them when they sleep. When they wake up. When they run, when they eat, when they laugh or cry or sneeze. When they ask questions or when they answer questions. What does that make me?” Linus snorted. “That makes you a father.”
“They’re certainly not kidnapping me,” David told the conductor. “Because I’m an adult who does adult things, like taxes and laundry and being sad for no reason.”
“There’s no such thing as too much glitter,” Chauncey told him. “Except if you eat it.”
Lucy beat him to it. He relaxed, cool as ice. “Yeah, probably,” he said, as if it were the easiest thing in the world. “I know karate, so it won’t be a fair fight. What’s he going to do? Make more fish and bread?” He pressed his hands against his cheeks, eyes wide. “Oh, Jesus, no, anything but that. Gasp! Are you turning water into wine? Curse you, street magician!”
Talia waved at him. “I like burying things, like seeds and people who cross me.”
Trust, Arthur knew, was a treasure effortlessly stolen, often without rhyme or reason. And this particular treasure was a fragile thing, a piece of thin glass easily broken. But here was David, surrounded by strangers in an unfamiliar place, attempting to pick up his pieces and put them back into a recognizable shape. Whatever else he was, David’s bravery in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds proved yet again what Arthur had always believed: magic existed in many forms, some extraordinary, some simple acts of goodwill and trust, small though they might be.
once you thought humanity was weird, given that when we’re not laughing, we’re crying or running for our lives because monsters are trying to eat us.” “And they don’t even have to be real monsters,” Lucy said. “They could be the ones we make up in our heads.”
Lucy tilted his head back, staring up at the ceiling. “It’s hard.” “What is?” “Being alive.” “It is,” Arthur agreed. “But perhaps that’s the point: the trials and tribulations of life weigh heavily upon us, but we find people to help lighten the load.
“Most parents don’t have the children we do,” Linus said. “No, they don’t. We’re lucky that way, I guess.”
of bad at cards,” Sal explained, scratching the back of his neck. “He said he could beat me at Old Maid. Turns out he couldn’t.” “Arthur?” “Yes, Linus?”
it’s okay to not be okay, so long as it doesn’t become all we know.”
we have one thing the government doesn’t. And it’s going to change everything.” “What’s that?” Arthur asked as Sal closed his eyes. “What do we have?” His son whispered two words before drifting off to sleep. “Each other.”
Lucy nodded. “And I’ll open up a dimensional doorway in the fabric of reality and send her to a place where even demons fear to tread. What is this evil place, you might be asking? Great question!” He spread his hands wide in a practiced display of showmanship. “It’s called … Florida.”
“Then maybe it’s time we took on the government. Show them what we’re really capable of.” “Anarchy!” Lucy shrieked, eyes burning red. “Chaos! Buffets with a never-ending supply of macaroni and cheese! Hellfire!”
“I heard tales of an inspector arriving on the island, but I never expected them to be so … you. Tell me, does your face normally look like that, or did you do it up special just for me?”
“That’s the problem with the world today. Everyone is so ready to be offended by just about anything.” “Maybe you shouldn’t be the one to decide what is or isn’t offensive to a person in the community you’re denigrating,”
“I was wondering if you’d given further thought to what we discussed.” “You’ll have to remind me what that was,” Talia said. “You talk a lot, and I don’t always pay attention.”
“I’ll need to see the residence.” “No.” Miss Marblemaw squinted at Zoe, her mustache frayed and bristly. “No?” Zoe shrugged. “No.” “You can’t say no.” “I just did.”
“The child had better not have done anything … illegal.” Arthur laughed. “What kind of monsters do you take us for? Don’t answer that. We already know.”
“I’d forgotten how much of a bitch you can be when you put your mind to it.” Arthur kissed her hair. “What a lovely thing to say.”
even the smallest things can change the world, if only one is brave enough to try.
