A magician is strong because he feels pain. He feels the difference between what the world is and what he would make of it. ... A magician is strong because he hurts more than others. His wound is his strength.

Quentin knew he wasn’t happy. Why not? He had painstakingly assembled all the ingredients of happiness. He had performed all the necessary rituals, spoken the words, lit the candles, made the sacrifices. But happiness, like a disobedient spirit, refused to come.

“I don’t think he really cares that much if we sneak out. But he appreciates it if you make an effort.”

ormolu

His world had become complicated and interesting and magical. Theirs was mundane and domestic. They didn’t understand that the world they could see wasn’t the one that mattered, and they never would.

saurian

The process of learning is a nonstop orgy of wonderment.

If a spell was going to work, then on some gut level you had to mean it.

December slid by on silent runners, in a sleepless dream of constant toil.

The scene was like an unshaken snow globe.

Mills Mess pattern and the faro shuffle and the Charlier cut

as if he’d gone from the first blush of infatuation to the terminal nostalgia of a former lover without even the temporary relief of an actual relationship in between.

palimpsest

sylvan

he felt the gravitational pull of the little kid he once was and in some unswept back corner of his soul always would be.

He couldn’t stay. Something about his parents’ house was unbearable to him now. After his little curved tower-top room, how could he go back to his dingy old bedroom in Brooklyn with its crumbly white paint and its iron bars on the window and its view of a tiny walled-in dirt patch? He had nothing to say to his well-meaning, politely curious parents. Both their attention and their neglect were equally intolerable. His world had become complicated and interesting and magical. Theirs was mundane and domestic. They didn’t understand that the world they could see wasn’t the one that mattered, and they never would.

Death always means something. But no, nothing apart from the usual.

This was real, human sex, and it was so much better just because they weren’t animals—because they were civilized and prudish and self-conscious humans who transformed into sweaty, lustful, naked beasts, not through magic but because that’s who on some level they really were all along.

oenological

out of a pure desire to lose control

But perfection is a nervy business, because the moment you spot the tiniest flaw it’s ruined.

He was drowning—why did he recoil whenever anybody reached down to help him?

epiphenomenon

“That’s the trouble with monsters. No theoretical rigor. No one ever made you iron out your fundamentals, did they? If they had, you certainly wouldn’t fall for this . . .”

Sure, you can live out your dreams, but it’ll only turn you into a monster.

his brain was waking up and needed new diversions to distract it. It wouldn’t leave him alone for long.

look at your life and see how perfect it is. Stop looking for the next secret door that is going to lead you to your real life. Stop waiting. This is it: there’s nothing else. It’s here, and you’d better decide to enjoy it or you’re going to be miserable wherever you go, for the rest of your life, forever.

He wondered what else he would say. I’ve got all kinds of demons inside of me, he thought. Not just the one.

In a way fighting like this was just like using magic. You said the words, and they altered the universe. By merely speaking you could create damage and pain, cause tears to fall, drive people away, make yourself feel better, make your life worse.

physiognomies

That’s the trouble with monsters. No theoretical rigor. No one ever made you iron out your fundamentals, did they? If they had, you certainly wouldn’t fall for this . . .

Le roi est mort

He would never have known the horror of really getting what he thought he wanted.

aeruginous

Sharp nose, thin mouth, chin-length mousy brown hair, with an air of powerful intelligence held in check by boredom.