"Seth knew he should not be here."

"In a certain reign (whose can it have been?) someone of no very great rank, among all His Majesty's Consorts and Intimates, enjoyed exceptional favor."

"Long ago there was a little land, over which ruled a regulus or kinglet, who was called King Peter, though his kingdom was but little."

"Bird, gazing down at the map of Africa that reposed in the showcase with the haughty elegance of a wild deer, stifled a short sigh."

"The first qualification for judging any piece of workmanship from a corkscrew to a cathedral is to know what it is-what it was intended to do and how it is meant to be used."

"There was no hope for him this time: it was the third stroke."

"Excellence in statistical graphics consists of complex ideas communicated with clarity, precision, and efficiency."

"Now was the night worn to the time appointed, for it was two hours after midnight, so he stepped out of his tent clad in all his war gear, and went straight to the doddered oak, and found Redhead there with but one horse, wherby Ralph knew that he held to his purpose of going his ways to Utterbol: so he took him by the shoulders and embraced him, rough carle as he was, and Redhead kneeled to him one moment of time and then arose and went off into the night."

"When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow."

"There was once a kindly old wizard who used his magic generously and wisely for the benefit of his neighbors."

"I'd had more than my fair share of near-death experiences; it wasn't something you ever really got used to."

"The Salinas Valley is in Northern California."

"'Let me kill him,' Cara said, her boot strikes sounding like rawhide mallets hammering the polished marble floor."

"She was born Anidori-Kiladra Talianna Isilee, Crown Princess of Kildenree, and she did not open her eyes for three days."

"This is my favorite book in all the world, though I have never read it."

"The last drops of the thundershower had hardly ceased falling when the Pedestrian stuffed his map into his pocket, settled his pack more comfortably on his tired shoulders, and stepped out from the shelter of a large chestnut-tree into the middle of the road."

"So far as we know... The Imperial Galactic Government decided, over a bucket of jeweled crabs one day, that a hyperspace expressway was needed in the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy."

"I clasp the flask between my hands even though the warmth from the tea has long since leached into the frozen air."

"When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold."

"It was not easy to live, being young, being so completely alone."

"My name is Robinette Broadhead, in spite of which I am male."

"Shusai, Master of Go, twenty-first in the Honnimbo succession, died in Atami, at the Urokoya Inn, on the morning of January 18, 1940."

"The train came out of the long tunnel into the snow country."

"My name is John Hodgman."

"'I don't believe he can live through the night,' George Cherrie wrote in his diary in the spring of 1914."