There's this assumption that all children have the luxury of a childhood where their innocence is always respected and their main occupation is pleasant play - at the age of 18 or 21, they are then thrust into the real world and shown its uglier side, but not before.

Margo Lanagan

Categorized in : World Children Age Childhood

Now you are in the true world, and a great deal more is required of you. Here you must befriend real wolves, and lure real birds down from the sky. Here you must endure real people around you, and we are not uniformly kind; we are damaged and impulsive, each in our own way. It is harder. It is not safe. But it is what you were born to.

real sky people

There is something about talking in the night, with the shreds of sleep around your ears, with the silences between one remark and another, the town dark and dreaming beyond your own walls. It draws the truth out of you, straight from its little dark pool down there, where usually you guard it so careful, and wave your hands over it and hum and haw to protect people's feelings, to protect your own . . . You can bring out the jaggedest feelings - if you are my wife and know how to state them calm - into the night quiet. They will float there for consideration, harming no one.

wall dream sleep

Her heart's too hurt...you frightened her. And she's such a straight lady--she sees shame where some of us just see people.

hurt heart people

How different other families were, the shape of them, the things they presumed, the children that grew up in them.

shapes different children

I felt freed to please myself, to find my way as I would, in a world that was much vaster than I had realized before, in which I was but one star-gleam, one wavelet, among multitudes. My happiness mattered not a whit more than the next person's - or the next fish's, or the next grass-blade's! - and not a whit less.

gleam stars world

It was one thing not to want a husband, I realized; it was quite another not to need one for the roof over your head, for your meat and bread, for the shoes on your feet and the coat on your back.

roof-over-your-head shoes husband

Why must we climb away to the seal-less parts of the world? by Margo Lanagan

Why must we climb away to the seal-less parts of the world?

seals climbs world

You are pure-hearted and lovely, and you have never done a moment's wrong. But you are a living creature, born to make a real life, however it cracks your heart.

lovely real heart

OTHERBOUND is a web of spells and counterspells, but Corinne Duyvis never loses sight of the bodies, minds and all-too-human emotions that absorb the impact of the magical power-plays. It's an action-packed tale of passion, possession and hair-raising leaps from world to world. As you read it, remember to keep breathing.

impact passion hair

How on earth do people imagine we equip children for life if we never show them the sorts of issues other people encounter, if we never talk through with them how they might deal with difficulty or violence or unexpected shocks and surprises?

violence life children people

I do occasionally get into that 'checking Twitter every five minutes' state - 'Please, help me avoid my work.' I have a writing room for when I get completely out of control, so I can put myself out of the Internet's reach.

myself me internet work

My mum was a librarian, and she brought home a lot of interesting books, and we just read and read. I suppose I didn't really think I could be a writer myself until I was working in editing in my 20s and discovered that actually, the books that came in were not very much like published books.

myself think editing home

I'm a very promiscuous reader. My dad's a big science fiction fan, so I'd read 'Dune,' and 'Watership Down' and 'The Lord Of The Rings.'

down dad lord science

It's useful to think of the imagination as an aspect of the body because it seems to have processes of its own that are obscure to us.

own think body imagination