Margaret Atwood, the Canadian novelist, once asked a group of women at a university why they felt threatened by men. The women said they were afraid of being beaten, raped, or killed by men. She then asked a group of men why they felt threatened by women. They said they were afraid women would laugh at them.

Short men are happy, for they can pass easily through the door. Tall men are happy, for they can stand erect and pluck oranges with their hands. Again, short men are angry, for they cannot stand erect and pluck oranges with their hands. Again, tall men are angry, for they cannot pass easily through the door.

Do you remember back at the hotel when you promised that if we lived, you’d get dressed up in a nurse’s outfit and give me a sponge bath?" asked Jace."It was Simon who promised you the sponge bath.""As soon as I’m back on my feet, handsome," said Simon."I knew we should have left you a rat.

Freddie experienced the sort of abysmal soul-sadness which afflicts one of Tolstoy's Russian peasants when, after putting in a heavy day's work strangling his father, beating his wife, and dropping the baby into the city's reservoir, he turns to the cupboards, only to find the vodka bottle empty.

I came to the table, pulled up a chair, and sat. “Everyone brought a pet. I feel left out.” An enthusiastic howl broke the silence, and Grendel bounded through the doorway. He galloped through the steak house, skidded on the floor, smashed into my chair, and dropped a dead rat on my lap. Awesome.

I regret that I didn’t realize that actually they’ve got no power over you at school — it’s all just a trick to indoctrinate you into being a conditioned, tame, placid citizen. Rebel, children, I urge you, fight the turgid slick of conformity with which they seek to smother your glory.

Hi. I'm here to enlist.You can't. You aren't human.You see, little fella, we don't do sociological stuff like "interspeciated workplaces." We're a crack company of space mercenaries. We do "hurting people" and "breaking things."Sounds like my kind of fun.-Schlock & Lieutenant Der Trihs

Strange, isn't it,' mused Glokta as he watched him struggle for air. 'Big men, small men, thin men, fat men, clever men, stupid men, they all respond the same to a fist in the guts. One minute you think you're the most powerful man in the world. The next you can't even breathe by yourself.

You're a rotten driver," I protested. "Either you ought to be more careful, or you oughtn't drive at all.""I am careful.""No you're not.""Well, other people are," she said lightly."What's that got to do with it?""They'll keep out of my way," she insisted. "It takes two to make an accident.

I’d bet a month of dawn patrols those apprentices had something to do with it,” Birchfall meowed. “Why else would they disappear back to ShadowClan without their mother?”Dustpelt let out a snort of amusement. “I can just picture those three holding Blackstar down until he agreed.

Mom. I have something to tell you. I’m undead. Now, I know you may have some preconceived notions about the undead. I know you may not be comfortable with the idea of me being undead. But I’m here to tell you that undead are just like you and me … well, okay. Possibly more like me than you.

Not every girl is like you,” Sid says sadly.“There are plenty like me. You just don’t find them in a mosh pit or with their tits hanging out outside the stage door.”“Damn, that’s my dating pool gone then,” mutters Seth from the front of the car and the others snigger.

Stop!" Narcissus got to his feet. "This is not right! This person is obviously not awesome, so he must be..." He struggled for the right words. It had probably been a long time since he'd talked about anything other than himself. "He must be tricking us." Apparently Narcissus wasn't completely stupid.

Of course, owls on the loose seemed strange to the uninitiated. One day an electrician came to work on the building's power supply, when, seemingly out of nowhere, an owl flew around a corner right at him. The poor guy let out an unearthly scream and hit the floor, covering his head and yelling in Spanish.

A girl’s got to use what she’s given and I’m not going to make a guy drool the way a Britney video does. So I take it to extremes. I don’t say I dress sexily on stage - what I do is so extreme. It’s meant to make guys think: ‘I don’t know if this is sexy or just weird.