F.D. Lee Quotes & Sayings

There isn't anything I can tell you that you don't already know," Melly answered.
"Yes, but if we already know it then you're not telling us anything new," Bea said, thinking her way through the carriages of fear on the witch's train of thought, "and if we don't tell you what we know and what we don't know, then you won't know if you've actually told us something we don't know, and what you don't know we don't know won't hurt you."
Melly stared at Bea, her cigarette hanging from her lip in defeat.
"Did that make sense?" Joan asked.
"Yes," Melly said slowly, "but it probably shouldn't have done. — F.D. Lee

The man, his feet tip-tapping softly on the stairs, hated it. He avoided the Index like a gambling addict avoids the tic-tac-tac of the dice table; but, like an addict, he was always, always aware of it: of the pull of the Books, and the darkness, and the silence. — F.D. Lee

There are a number of rules that should be observed when one meets royalty, ranging from what one can say and when, to where one should stand, when one can sit, even where one should look. Sindy bobbed a nervous curtsy and, before being introduced, blurted out an invitation to come inside whilst looking John directly in the eye. — F.D. Lee

The woman above him had tumbled out of his dreams, and now stood like a half-waking ghost, a photograph double exposed, showing him in one moment the fallacy of his past as it bled into his future. The image of Maria Sophia had grown too large for him to bear. He had made it so. In his industry and creativity he had transformed her into something so wonderful that the very fact she might now be anything less terrified him almost as much as the prospect she might exceed it. — F.D. Lee

Mistasinon stood as the music of life flowed around him, the instrument of his agency muted. — F.D. Lee

You don't approve?" Joan asked, picking up on Delphine's tone.
"Their stories were for themselves, not the Mirrors."
"What do you mean?" said Bea.
"Certainly sometimes a good little character would find a lamp, and would not be so corrupted by the strangely endless possibilities of three wishes that they ended up causing more harm than they ever imagined. Those stories fostered belief, they were retold, certainly; but they were few and far between. Most of the genie's tales showed the characters exactly who they really were, not when they were despised and degraded, not when they'd reached the gutter and been given licence to look at the stars. No, the genies showed them who they were when they were invincible. The characters, they try to forget stories like that. — F.D. Lee

She was here and the world, for so long ugly and deformed, was all at once itself again. She was taking a glass of sweet wine from one of the waiters. She was smiling. She was breathing. She was here. She was an island of such colossal importance within a sea of inconsequence that it seemed impossible the Ball was able to continue its empty existence. — F.D. Lee

You don't know anything about me."
"No, I know not everything about you. But I sense enough to know you have mistaken obsession with drive, guilt with injustice. I know you want to escape what you are, cabbage fairy," he said, reaching for his hood and gloves and tucking them into the waistband of his trousers. "Your desires are no different from my own, I simply have the courage to face them. — F.D. Lee

How can we learn the value of saying no, if we didn't occasionally say yes? — F.D. Lee

You worked at night, when the shadows masked you and you were little more than a dream. You hid in the forest or the mountains, away from the steam engines and the lamps of the cities, the things that would expose you, confirming you and stripping you of your mystery. You showed yourself rarely, and only to the ones who needed to see you. After the free-for-all that was the earlier Chapters, when babies were stolen, young men murdered and maidens locked away, the fae had had to learn to be very careful about their involvement in the lives of the characters, lest they turn still further away from their beliefs. — F.D. Lee

The Teller Cares About You. — F.D. Lee

Once upon a time there was war, and starvation, and death. Once upon a time we would kill our brothers and sisters, fearing for our own lives. Once upon a time the characters turned from us, and we wept. Now we do not war, nor do we fear, nor do we weep. We Redact. — F.D. Lee

It was one thing to believe in yourself, but quite another to bet. — F.D. Lee

It's a terrible person who listens to what we say rather than what we mean — F.D. Lee