Jasper Fforde

I’d been so convinced of that particular narrative I never for one moment stopped to reappraise the situation.

It would have been easy to dislike her intensely, but I actually felt nothing for her at all.

The numbers were too great for HiberTech to hide what had happened. As it was, well-engineered corporate surprise, orchestrated bafflement, faux delight, suitable soul-searching and feigned contrition won the day.

“What do you think?”

“I can hardly contain my indifference.”

“I lost sixty soldiers under my command.”

“Your fault?” I asked.

“No, but they were all my responsibility, so it amounts to the same thing.”

There were the rules we were taught, and there were the rules we did our job by. The two were related, but as distant cousins rather than siblings.

Feedback loops, echo chambers, circular reinforcement. All could play a part in escalating the utterly imaginary to the level of reality, sometimes with fatal consequences.

If you’ve not dreamed, you’ve never truly slept. Dreams are the place where you can be yourself; do anything, be anything. The mind set free.

I don’t care one way or the other if the big A is using you to scratch an itch, but think very carefully of actions, Wonky. They have a dismaying tendency to be followed by consequences, and sometimes quite bad ones.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not,” he said, “it’s what everyone believes that’s important.”

“I always really admired you growing up. Always smiling through your unhappiness. A real inspiration.”

“I wasn’t unhappy.”

“You looked unhappy.”

“Looks can be deceptive.”

“All too true,” she said, “but I meant what I said: inspirational in a sort of tragic way, like you were the failure in the family, but always looked on the bright side of everything.”

“You’re very kind,” I said, long used to Megan’s ways, “but it could have been much worse: I could have been born without tact or empathy, and be shallow, self-absorbed and hideously patronizing.”

“Agree?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I don’t like subordinates always agreeing,” she said. “Sycophants have no place in my department. You’re to speak your mind when the opportunity calls for it.”

“How will I know when that is?”

“I shall inform you.”