Daniel Handler

I guess it's funny how life turns out?" she tried. "Not last I checked," Errol said with a snort.

She was all the world__ money, and I would spend it with her, my sharpest friend who changed the tide, my only comfort from the brutal gamble of the world and the wicked ways of men.

It will be a very long time before I trust you ever, ever - OK, I trust you again.

I'm not a believer in predetermined fates, being rewarded for one's efforts. I'm not a believer in karma. The reason why I try to be a good person is because I think it's the right thing to do. If I commit fewer bad acts there will be fewer bad acts, maybe other people will join in committing fewer bad acts, and in time there will be fewer and fewer of them.

The thing with your heart's desire is that your heart doesn't even know what it desires until it turns up.

Call me later, you__ said, so I could call you later, at night, and it is those nights I miss you, Ed, the most, on the phone, you beautiful bastard.

A library is like an island in the middle of a vast sea of ignorance, particularly if the library is very tall and the surrounding area has been flooded.

He thought she knew what he meant, but the biggest mistake you can make is thinking they know what you mean.

No, when you love someone you spend hours and hours with them, and even the mightiest forces in the netherworld could not say whether the hours you spend increase your love or if you simply spend more hours with someone as your love increases.

For every girl I thought I was uncomplicated sex, it wasn't. Put it this way: if you can't see the complication, you're probably it.

There are so many movies like this, where you thought you were smarter than the screen but the director was smarter than you, of course he's the one, of course it was a dream, of course she's dead, of course, it's hidden right there, of course it's the truth and you in your seat have failed to notice in the dark.

Everything else has vanished, so you take them now. Maybe if you're the one keeping them, I'll be the one feeling better.

I write longhand on legal pads, about half at home and half in cafes. I drink a lot of water and eat a lot of raw carrots.

I write every day weekdays for about 5 hours, mostly longhand on legal pads. It has gotten neither harder nor easier, sadly or happily.

I like to give people novels I think they would like, on no particular occasion - just when we're in a bookstore together. I like to receive reference books on my birthday.

I didn't like books where people played on a sports team and won a bunch of games, or went to summer camp and had a wonderful time. I really liked a book where a witch might cut a child's head off or a pack of angry dogs might burst through a door and terrorize a family.

Maybe, generations ago, young people rebelled out of some clear motive, but now, we know we__e rebelling. Between teen movies and sex-ed textbooks we__e so ready for our rebellious phase we can__ help but feel it__ safe, contained. It will turn out all right, despite the risk, snug in the shell of rebellion narrative. Rebellion narrative, does that make sense? It was appropriate to do, so we did it.

I know you can't see it, not you, Ed, but maybe if I tell you the whole plot you'll understand it this once, because even now I want you to see it. I don't love you anymore, of course I don't, but there's still something I can show you. You know I want to be a director, but you never truly see the movies in my head and that, Ed, is why we broke up.