Megan Whalen Turner: Likeness

“She's like a prisoner inside stone walls, and every day the walls get a little thicker, the doorways a little narrower."
"And?" Eddis prompted.
"Well," said Eugenides, "it's a challenge.”

“… her queen danced like a flame in the wind, and the mercurial king like the weight at the center of the earth…”

“I would very much like to strangle someone. Why don't you go away until I decide it isn't you?”

“I hate horses. I know people who think that they are noble, graceful animals, but regardless of what a horse looks like from a distance, never forget that it's as likely to step on your foot as look at you.”

“So Sophos thinks you're going to marry me."
"While I think you'll marry Sophos."
"I might. We'll see what he's like when he grows up.”

“One cannot toss ambassadors back like bad fish," said Eugenides. "You treat them with care, or you'll find you've committed an act of war.”

“The queen!" someone shouted in alarm, and the King erupted like a wild animal caught in a snare.”

“The queen was settling on the edge of the bed, ungainly with hesitation and at the same time exquisite in her grace, like a heron landing in a treetop.”

“The Thieves of Eddis don't have breaking points. We have flash points instead, like gunpowder.”

“If Attolia could look like a queen, Eugenides was like a god revealed, transformed into something wholly unfamiliar, surrounded by the cloth-of-gold bedcover like a deity on an altar, passionless and calculating.”

“The factory doesn't like to hear too much talk about things it doesn't believe in. Contrary to what you may have heard, the factory has never found a single problem caused by ghosts. So if you meet any ectoplasmic spirits up there in the high crane, I suggest you be polite and they'll probably be polite right back. You're up there alone for fourteen hours a day, and you might find it's nice to have someone to talk to.”