The Library of the Unwritten (Hell's Library #1)

by A.J. Hackwith

It is a story’s natural ambition to wake up and start telling itself to the world.

Fear was an operation of the imagination, the ability to see an empty space and imagine. Imagine what might be there, the possibilities filling in what reality left blank. To be afraid was an exercise of self-inspired suffering, and Brevity wore inspiration in her skin.

“You can care and still cause harm. Feeling, caring, for someone else is the worst kind of weapon, in my experience. It allows you to do things you never thought you could do and things you never thought you would do. All for the love of someone else. It’s a trap I’d avoided on principle

How much easier it would be if everyone knew their role: the hero, the sidekick, the villain. Our books would be neater and our souls less frayed. But whether you have blood or ink, no one’s story is that simple. Librarian Gregor Henry, 1982 CE

There’s more to every one of us than what our story intends.”