Quotes from Frances Hardinge

Before the war, everyone had their rung on the ladder, and they didn't look much below or above it. But now? Low and high died side by side in Flanders Fields, and looked much the same facedown in the mud.

Makepeace did not know who the 'others' might be, but others were always a threat.

The two women exchanged a slight and hasty smile. And that flash of a smile was enough for Faith to understand that Mrs. Vellet was not dry, and Miss Hunter was not cold, and to sense a moment of rightness like two notes in accord, the tiniest fragment of a melody that she did not understand.

The world is full of liars of different humors. Coy liars drop their eyes. Bold liars forget to blink.

There is something elevated in the female spirit that will always hold a woman back from the coldest and most vicious forms of villainy.' 'No, there isn't,' Miss Kitely said kindly but firmly, as she set a dish in his hand.

The passing seconds became dangerous and spacious. The rules tinkled silently as they broke.

As usual, his expression was distracted but intense, as if listening to the world whispering something that riled him.

It occurred to her that she and Clent were a good deal like clock hands, one large and one small, often pointing and striving in opposite directions, but always linked and bound to come into line sooner or later.

We are what we do and what we allow to be done.

A tree can grow two hundred years, and look like it'll last a thousand more - but when lightning strikes at last, it burns.

It's as if they're wearing a lie, but it doesn't fit them." Trista tried to straighten her thoughts. "They haven't buttoned it the right way, so it's baggy in some places and coming away in others.

No, from what you say your father was an atheist, an out-and-out unbeliever. Atheism will see your head spiked on a church spire just as soon as Birdcatchery." Mosca was silent for a few moments. "But, Mr. Clent," she said at last, "what if he was right? What if it's true?

N?jak p?ežijeme. A budeme se snažit dát tomuhle novému sv?tu podobu, dokud je ješt? tvárný. Když to neud?láme my, tak to ud?lají ti druzí.

You might as well hurl cherries at a mountain.

We are about to have a very important conversation, and later you will want to know exactly - exactly - when it started.

Humans living and dead might suddenly turn on you, but wild things just lived on in their brute, wild way, caring nothing for you. When they died, they left no ghosts.

She had never guessed at the doubts secretly quarrying their way into the heart of the rock. It was like learning that God had ceased to believe in Himself.

Right now he was trying to make a whole strange new world feel safe.

Perhaps the world has always been like this, Mosca thought as she pushed her way through the crowd. Like a broken honeypot that looks whole, but just holds together because the shards are resting in place and are glued together with honey.

Show me how clever you can be, Faith.

The Great Outside that had filled Neverfell's thoughts had noticed her and judged her. It had found her wanting. No, worse than that, it had screamed in horror and disgust and fled from her.

She had a murder to find, and an island to frighten. Frightened people sometimes made mistakes, and it was a good day to be a ghost.

She had a murderer to find, and an island to frighten.

He was tumbling through feelings that he did not understand, and only knew that he wanted to run and scream.