An antelope or a gazelle, tiny as a beetle, tumbled out of his coat sleeve and splatted on the floor below. Mister Bumblethorn studiously ignored this.

They moved into this house forty-something years ago. And my great-grandmother had been here seventy years and would never know about that attic.

As soon as Alba was done, Madison seized the glass with two hands and drank steadily, her sharp breaths like puffs of a little steam engine. The Kool-Aid went fast.

He remembers the last time he threw up, when he accidentally swallowed a Filipino term. Different languages are poisonous for him if he isn’t careful.

I had no beauty and little talent for magic. My mother assured me I was a late bloomer. I didn’t believe her.

Even though he was a god, Daisuke always removed his shoes before he went inside. It was the polite thing to do.

Princess Diana’s ghost emerges at night. There are other ghosts, presumably, but she doesn’t see them. She only sees the living.

The wizard’s calico daughter, Anya, was not a wizard. Oh, she could do magic; in fact, she often helped her father with his work. But she didn’t want to be a wizard, and her father didn’t want her to be one either.

“Tribals are crap, redneck poser ink. Do yourself a favor and piss off.”