• Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

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• "I know that she returns to the labyrinth often. Sometimes we go together; sometimes she goes alone. The quiet and the solitude attract her strongly. In them she hopes to find what she needs.
• It worries me.
• 'Don't disappear,' I tell her sternly. 'Do not disappear.'
• She makes a rueful, amused face. 'I won't,' she says.
• 'We can't keep rescuing each other,' I say. 'It's ridiculous.'
• She smiles. It is a smile with a little sadness in it."

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• "'A lot of missing people turn up at seaside places,' he muses. 'It's the sea, I suppose. It has a soothing effect.'"

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• "The Hall where I usually sleep — the Third Northern Hall — is full of birds and at night I hear the little sounds as they shift and flutter on their perches."

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• "The Beams of the Declining Sun shone through the Windows of the Lower Halls, striking the Surface of the Waves and making ripples of golden Light flow across the Ceiling of the Staircase and over the Faces of the Statues. When night fell, I listened to the Songs that the Moon and Stars were singing and I sang with them."