“Call no man happy, said Shadow, until he is dead”

“The best thingin Shadow's opinion, perhaps the only good thingabout being in prison was a feeling of relief. The feeling that he'd plunged as low as he could plunge and he'd hit bottom. He didn't w...”

“I believe that life is a game, that life is a cruel joke, and that life is what happens when you're alive and that you might as well lie back and enjoy it.”

“Are you happy? asked Mr. Nancy, suddenly. He had been staring at Shadow for several hours. Whenever Shadow glanced over to his right, Mr. Nancy was looking at him with his earth-brown eyes. Not rea...”

“Hey," said Shadow. "Huginn or Muninn, or whoever you are." The bird turned, head tipped, suspiciously, on one side, and it stared at him with bright eyes."Say 'Nevermore,'" said Shadow."Fuck you," ...”

“The house smelled musty and damp, and a little sweet, as if it were haunted by the ghosts of long-dead cookies.”

“Oh heaven and hell, stop with the tears. Given the day Sarah had just had, the tears were logical. But watching her face crumple, hearing the gut-deep harsh sobs, filled Rukh with an irrational nee...”

“Almost as if speaking to herself, she continued, I would love to fly. I've always wondered what it be like to have that sense of freedom.A wistful note in her voice tugged at something deep inside ...”

“London was littered with social clubs and houses of chance, but Malfeasance was not just any gaming hell. It was located in the most notorious part of London and, Graydon had heard, was run by a pa...”

“People couldn't become truly holy, he said, unless they also had the opportunity to be definitively wicked.”