Wilbur Clements

“David, you have been so kind to me and this gift will always be treasured. I have one last request. Could you show me some of the secret ways in and out of the castle?”
As he spoke the words, the image of the spark of red light appearing from the depths of the castle sprang to his mind again, together with the whispered words, “I am here, Audun.” He knew that one day he would have to return to Aldene and learn the secret of what lay in the deep dungeon below the castle”
― Robert Reid, The Emperor

“I may be mad, he thought, but I prefer the shit of this world to whatever sweet ambrosias the next may offer.”
― Tom Robbins, Jitterbug Perfume

“The money we spend to help you is really to help ourselves. We invest in you because you will do great things, and we want to be part of it.”
― Steven Decker, Projector for Sale

“The airport in Sofia was a tiny place; I'd expected a palace of modern communism, but we descended to a modest area of tarmac and strolled across it with the other travelers. Nearly all of them were Bulgarian,
I decided, trying to catch something of their conversations. They were
handsome people, some of them strikingly so, and their faces varied
from the dark-eyed pale Slav to a Middle-Eastern bronze, a kaleidoscope
of rich hues and shaggy black eyebrows, noses long and flaring, or
aquiline, or deeply hooked, young women with curly black hair and noble
foreheads, and energetic old men with few teeth. They smiled or laughed and talked eagerly with one another; one tall man gesticulated to his companion with a folded newspaper. Their clothes were distinctly not Western, although I would have been hard put to say what it was about the cuts of suits and skirts, the heavy shoes and dark hats, that was unfamiliar to me.”
― Elizabeth Kostova, The Historian