Impossible Creatures

Do not wait for people to be flawless before you allow yourself to adore them. Adore them anyway. (p. 169)

But Christopher didn't have the words, then, to explain what, nonetheless, he knew: that sometimes, if you are among the very lucky, a spark of understanding cuts like lightning across the space between two people. 'It's a defibrillator for the heart. And it toughens you. It nourishes you. And the word we've chosen for it (which is an insufficient word for being so abruptly upended in a new and finer place) is friendship!

I need you to tell people this; I need you, when you get back, to tell them: the brutality is terrible. And yes: the chaos is very great. But tell them: greater than the world’s chaos are its miracles. (p 309)

It is so difficult, to be alive. It is so difficult, and it is so beautiful. (p 309)

What should you do with your one brief life? The answer is different for each person. There is no neat answer, through many have tried to offer one. There are no answers to being alive. There are only strong pieces of advice. (p 168)

The riddles ensure that we tell our secrets to those who have already learned how to think.

that sometimes, if you are among the very lucky, a spark of understanding cuts like lightning across the space between two people. It’s a defibrillator for the heart. And it toughens you. It nourishes you. And the word we’ve chosen for it (which is an insufficient word for being so abruptly upended in a new and finer place) is friendship. (He would never find it again, that kind of friendship. But once is enough. You need it only once—so that you may know what your human heart is capable of.)

Mal—“stop expecting life to get easier. It never does; that is not where its goodness lies. Or”—and she looked at Irian, at Nighthand—“do not wait for people to be faultless before you allow yourself to adore them. Adore them anyway. Such things are worth more than riddles.” There

For instance: consider the greatest riddle of all—what you should do with your one brief life? The answer is different for each person. There is no neat answer, though many have tried to offer one. There are no answers to being alive. There are only strong pieces of advice.

What good is the research if no one will listen?

Christopher looked hesitantly at the jaculus: it would be like attempting to commute on the back of a hummingbird.

That is why great power must never reside in only one person. It must be shared.” Her rough voice was rougher than before. “It must be spread, among as many good women and men as can be found; not because it is kind or polite or fair, but because it is the only way to beat back against horror.

What is this rainfall of children? Did I go sailing just to have storms of infants cascading down my sail at me? (p. 74)

I have seen people struggle to learn – painting, gardens, language, hand-skills, foot-skills – and I have seen them triumph. I have seen kindnesses large and wild enough to transform you. I have heard the best jokes in the world and music so sweet I thought I might fall down because of it. I have seen so much done for love, over and over. I have seen people die for love and live for love. I have seen birth, and birth again. I have known such joy. The joy,

But it was not simple. Very little, after all, is ever simple.

Do not wait for people to be faultless before you allow yourself to adore them. Adore them anyway. Such things are worth more than riddles.

Stop expecting life to get easier. It never does; that is not where its goodness lies.

Some sentences have the power to change everything. There are the usual suspects: I love you, I hate you, I’m pregnant, I’m dying, I regret to tell you that this country is at war. But the words with the greatest power to create both havoc and marvels are these: “I need your help.

None of us do. We none of us expected this. That is, in general, the nature of adventures. Adventurers tend to smell. The great epic tales stank, I think, more than the historians give them credit for.

I have seen the dark: dark stacked upon dark. I have seen such purposeless sorrow. I have seen fear, and dread, I have seen death. (p 305)

Beauty is overrated, but it is not a sin. (p. 142)

I'm no philosopher, and I prefer, in an ideal world, to go uneaten. (p. 111)

mean it could point you through the maze? Without the potion?” For a moment her face convulsed with shock, with hope, with something stranger and more complicated than both; and then she shook her head. “The sphinxes said da Vinci set the maze with traps. Even if it could—I don’t know if it would—it wouldn’t be enough. It has to be me.” But she held the casapasaran tightly in her hand, and when she thought he wasn’t looking, he saw her press it to her cheek. —

And they do not love. How could they, when they mustn’t fear? Love has fear baked into it.” He

I won't pretend that you're forgiven. Your kind are excused so much, so often, so easily - a flash of money and all's well. I won't play that game. (p 267)

A miracle had come to an end. (p 205)

Hope is a little lie that the powerless use to comfort themselves. (p 196)

Then... Could I drive your car to where there would be?" "I think you're about four or five years off being old enough, aren't you?" "But the car's an automatic - and there's nothing I could hit, round here, except the trees. And the trees aren't going to make any sudden movements. Please?" (p. 23)

The lavellan has no interest in harming humans unless provoked, but its definition of ‘provoked’ is a broad one and can include sniffing, laughing and all forms of interpretive dance.