"Whenever you read a good book, it's like the author is right there, in the room, talking to you, which is why I don't like to read good books."

i've started dogearing the books i read, and writing down my favorite lines. these are some of the bits i liked most...

I had learned a little about chess on my own in the prior week, even before reading the chess books he'd included: enough to know the difference between tactics and strategy. Tactics were shrot-term moves to position yourself. But strategy was how you won the game. (229)

The stress of the old year was about to explode like a box of spring-loaded snakes. I remembered why I had always avoided going out non New Year's Eve. The fortune-teller seemed oblivious to her surroundings. (40)

"Tell me," said Nim, putting his hand under my chin and turning my face up to his, "have you ever heard of the Montglane Service?" (137)

"But I chose not to follow a career as a mathematician," said Mordecai. "They say you must have a calling for it, much as for the priesthood." (188)

Skeletons of mice are often to be found in coconuts, for it is easier to get in, slim and greedy, than to get out, appeased but fat. --Victor Korchnoi (211)

I decided I believed in God. (433)

Only in mathematics was there that sense of moving through another dimension, one that didn't exist in time and place - that feeling of falling into and through a puzzle, of having it surround you in a physical way. (535)