(Notable Quotables is a meme originally brought to you by the Bewitched Bookworms. Every Monday you’re invited to share a favorite quote or two from the books you’ve been reading.)
The Fantasy genre is one of my favorites. This includes the obvious things like dragons, witches, and make-believe places, but Fantasy is a more flexible genre than that.
A good alternate reality novel enthralls me, and no one does alternate realities quite like Jasper Fforde, author of the Thursday Next series (one of my favorites series of all time). This quote comes from The Well of Lost Plots, and yes, it’s that Miss Havisham:
” ‘Anything is possible in the Book World,’ murmured Miss Havisham. ‘The only barriers are those of the human imagination. See the other libraries?’
Not more than five miles distant, just visible in the aerial haze, was another tower like ours, and beyond that, another — and over to my right, six more. We were just one towering library of hundreds — or perhaps thousands.
‘The nearest one to us is German,’ said Miss Havisham, ‘beyond that French and Spanish. Arabic is just beyond them — and that one over there is Welsh.’ “
I’m a sucker for Fforde, but as any of my friends can tell you, dragons are my Achilles Heel. And the Dragonslayer’s Guyde is a book I’d love to get my hands on:
“If you would seek out dragons, seek first for a green-eyed girl.”
What are you reading this week?