The Book That Wouldn’t Burn (The Library Trilogy, #1)

by Mark Lawrence

Truth will set you free . . . from certainty, comfort, and the beliefs upon which we rely for sanity . . .

Scent is a peg on which memories are hung.

Trust is the most insidious of poisons, but there are many alternatives that serve almost as well. As with comedy, delivery is a vital component. If the target is aware of the attack, the chances for success are immediately much reduced. Venom, by Sister Apple

Truth, though, didn’t care a whit for making sense and could ride roughshod over people’s expectations.

“What does nostalgia mean to a child? An abstraction. A standing stone waiting for them in the mist. Walk a path across some decades, any path you like, and the word will gather weight. It will come to you trailing maybes and might-have-beens. Nostalgia is a drug, a knife. Against young skin it carries a dull edge, but time will teach you that nostalgia cuts—and that it’s a blade we cannot keep from applying to our own flesh.”

“You see, Malar,” Yute said. “I told you she was tenacious.” “Brothel-crabs are tenacious,” Malar grunted.

“Old dogs can teach us new tricks. An old dog shuffles on, relentlessly happy, still interested in the world. Even when they’re too worn out to run it’s still there—no bitterness, no regret, no looking back, just on to the next thing with amiable confusion. Dogs are nothing but good.”

Life’s cheap, easily spent. And if there’s any joy to be had it’s in the moments between. So, when you find something that makes you happy you take it with both hands, and you hold on to it for as long as you can. It’s not going to last. It will be taken from you. But that’s not the point. The point is that you took your chance, you drank the wine, you took what good you could from the world, and you gave it yours.” Evar turned to look at his brother. “I’m not sure you’re cut out to be a murderer.”

She had taken her real estate in his soul fraction by fraction over the years, advancing her claim with such slow stealth that he had never noticed.

Ghosts surround us. We swim through their currents, breathe them in, perform our lives before their audience. And yet, they remain unseen, not only by us but by each other. A multitude of loneliness, a crowding silence full of screams. The Haunting of Crath City, by Olidan Ancrath