In height he was rather over six feet, and so excessively lean that he seemed to be considerably taller. His eyes were sharp and piercing, save during those intervals of torpor to which I have alluded; and his thin, hawk-like nose gave his whole expression an air of alertness and decision. His chin, too, has the prominence and squareness which mark the man of determination. His hands were invariably blotted with ink and stained with chemicals, yet he was possessed of extraordinary delicacy of touch, as I frequently had occasion to observe when I watched him manipulating his fragile philosophical instruments

I thought of her in that cold ruined house, with night birds keening over her and rain gentle all around, dying of breathing.

Part of the debtor mentality is a constant, frantically suppressed undercurrent of terror. We have one of the highest debt-to-income ratios in the world, and apparently most of us are two paychecks from the street. Those in power—governments, employers—exploit this, to great effect. Frightened people are obedient—not just physically, but intellectually and emotionally. If your employer tells you to work overtime, and you know that refusing could jeopardize everything you have, then not only do you work the overtime, but you convince yourself that you’re doing it voluntarily, out of loyalty to the company; because the alternative is to acknowledge that you are living in terror. Before you know it, you’ve persuaded yourself that you have a profound attachment to some vast multi-national corporation: you’ve indentured not just your working hours, but your entire thought process. The only people who are capable of either unfettered action or unfettered thought are those who—either because they’re heroically brave, or because they’re insane, or because they know themselves to be safe—are free from fear.

Our entire society’s based on discontent: people wanting more and more and more, being constantly dissatisfied with their homes, their bodies, their decor, their clothes, everything. Taking it for granted that that’s the whole point of life, never to be satisfied. If you’re perfectly happy with what you’ve got—specifically if what you’ve got isn’t all that spectacular—then you’re dangerous. You’re breaking all the rules, you’re undermining the sacred economy, you’re challenging every assumption that society’s built on. That’s why Rafe’s dad throws a mickey fit whenever Rafe say he’s happy where he is. The way he sees it, we’re all subversives. We’re traitors.

If you’ve ever seen a dead body, you know how they change the air: that huge silence, the absence as strong as a black hole, time stopped and molecules frozen around the still thing that’s learned the secret, the one he can never tell. Most dead people are the only thing in the room. Murder victims are different; they don’t come alone. The silence rises up to a deafening shout and the air is streaked and hand-printed, the body smokes with the brand of that other person grabbing you just as hard: the killer.

By the end of my stint in murder I could feel it coming: felt the high sing of madness in the air, the city hunching and twitching like a rabid dog building towards the rampage.

I write to give myself strength. I write to be the characters that I am not. I write to explore all the things I’m afraid of.

Sometimes I feel there are two me’s, one coasting directly on top of the other. The superficial me, who nods when she’s supposed to nod and says what she’s supposed to say, and some other, deeper part, the part that worries and dreams and says “Gray.” Most of the time they move along in sync and I hardly notice the split, but sometimes it feels as though I’m two whole different people and I could rip apart at any second.

“Is this a true story?” Wendy asked.

Of course. All Stories are true. Or mostly true anyway.

The point is, his children do survive. They always survive. They look horror in the face and walk by with a sniff. If I have to define the art of Sendak, I’d use one word: heroic.

I believe that children in this country need a more robust literary diet than they are getting. … It does not hurt them to read about good and evil, love and hate, life and death. Nor do I think they should read only about things that they understand. “…a man’s reach should exceed his grasp.” So should a child’s. For myself, I will never talk down to—or draw down to—children.

“You think we’re savages, boy?”

Tubby Ted, whimpering, scooted back a foot on his bottom.

“We’re not savages here,” continued Fighting Prawn. “I know. I’ve seen savagery. I saw it often when I was a… guest of the British navy. I experienced it many times myself, at the wrong end of a whip. Oh yes, boy, I know what savagery is, and it’s not to be found here.”

“Well, Mr. Peter Nobody,” said Molly, “Do you know how old you are?”

“How old are you?” said Peter.

“I’m twelve,” said Molly.

“I’m thirteen,” said Peter.

“Wait,” said Molly. “I just remembered. Today is my birthday. I’m fourteen.”

Peter frowned. “Wait,” he said. “If you were twelve, and today’s your birthday, you’d be thirteen.”

“Not in my family, said Molly. “In my family, we only celebrate even-numbered birthdays.”

Peter was impressed. He’d never thought of that. “I just remembered something myself,” he said. “Today is also my birthday, and I am now”—he paused dramatically—“sixteen.”

“Don’t you be playing with the rats!” said Slank, cuffing James on the ear. “They make a tasty treat when the food runs out.”

“The food runs out?” asked Tubby Ted, suddenly reluctant to take another step. “When?”

Slank slapped him across the ear and said, “After we eat you.”

We are writing for children, but not for idiots