Dad and Lisette. And of course George is

“Changing memories is a good superpower, I suppose.”

you can’t get rid of the bad, you have to top it up with more goody stuff.”

That’s what Granny calls lies: “other versions of the truth.”

their argument about the difference between “sexual harassment” and “basic appreciation of a perfectly splendid ass.”

As if Spider- Man, one of Elsa’s favorite superheroes, had an antagonist called Slip- Up Man whose superpower was that he couldn’t even climb onto a bench. But in a good way.

Elsa is the sort of child who learned early in life that it’s easier to make your way if you get to choose your own soundtrack.

Are they planning to send him to Mordor to destroy the ring, or what?”

And the boy’s always dancing. He dances his way through his existence.

The name on the envelope is the same name as the one on The Monster’s mailbox. And the only word Elsa can read in the letter is “Miamas.”

drunk trying to calm down the shoehorn, before disappearing into her flat again.

“When it comes to terror, reality’s got nothing on the power of the imagination,”

“What do you get from someone who has everything?”

“What do you GIVE to someone who has everything?”

that not all monsters are monsters in the beginning, and not all monsters look like monsters. Some carry their monstrosity inside.

Because not all monsters were monsters in the beginning. Some are monsters born of sorrow.

parquet floor.

Because not all monsters look like monsters. There are some that carry their monstrosity inside.

Because improbable tragedies create improbable superheroes.

“There are many ways of being alone, darling.”

“People can turn into idiots if they’re alone for long enough,” agrees

regretters look more or less like white horses, although they are far more ambivalent and suffer from the biological defect of never being able to make up their minds.

smoke two cigarettes one after the other, lighting the second by the embers of the

She peers at Elsa, a little as one peers at a person one meets outside a bathroom, where one has spent just a tad too long.

“Well, maybe it sounds stupid now, but it seemed more logical at the time! Everything seems obvious in hindsight!”

It’s strange how quickly the significance of a certain smell can change, depending on what path it decides to take through the brain. It’s strange how close love and fear live to each other.

It’s easier to get people talking about things they dislike than things they like, Elsa has noticed.

Elsa wanted to have someone she could discuss them with afterwards.

If you don’t like people, they can’t hurt you.

like him a lot too, that’s what I wanted to say. It’s been a long time since I had such an amazing reading experience. You almost never do, once you grow up, things are at their peak when you’re a child and then it’s all downhill from there . . . well . . . because of the cynicism, I suppose. I just wanted to thank you for reminding me of how things used

The Brothers Lionheart, by Astrid Lindgren.

Death’s greatest power is not that it can make people die, but that it can make people want to stop living.

George used to say that Granny wasn’t a time- optimist, she was a time- atheist, and the only religion she believed in was Do- It- Later- Buddhism.

But only a little. And she thinks that the mystery of the locked stroller is like the opening of an insanely awful Agatha Christie novel.

“Don’t fight with monsters, for you can become one. If you look into the abyss for long enough, the abyss looks into you.”

could mean that if you hate the one who hates, you could risk becoming like the one you hate.”

You’re allowed to nick stuff if it’s good.

“I said I think your grandmother would have wanted you to dress up as any bloody thing you like,”

You have to believe in something in order to understand the tales.

And there’s a Russian playwright who once said that if there’s a pistol hanging on the wall in the first act, it has to be fired before the last act is over.

Elsa sobs as she unfolds it, the way one sobs when the tears have run out but not the crying.

“When you were small, we always read together. I always knew which chapter you were on in every book. But you read so quickly now, and keep up with all the things you like. Harry Potter seems to mean such a lot to you, and I want to understand the things that mean a lot to you,”

who’s also an accountant and a doctor and, it’s emerged, works a bit on the side as a librarian.