David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"I sit in my treeI sing like the birdsMy beak is my penMy songs are my poems."

David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"Words should wander and meander. They should fly like owls and flicker like bats and slip like cats. They should murmur and scream and dance and sing."

David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"They climbed the wide stairways. Their footsteps echoed and echoed through the house. "What on earth will you be doing with something so large?" said Mum."I shall live in it with my servants, of course," said Mina. "Or I shall establish a school.""A school, my lady?""Yes. A school for the writing of nonsense and the pursuit of extraordinary activities."

David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"We stand dead still and we listen to the night. The city drones. An owl hoots and a cat howls and a dog barks and a siren wails.We let the stars shine into us."

David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"We come to a lamp beside the pathway, and suddenly we stop walking, and we start to dance, and we glitter in the shafts of light, like stars, like flies, like flakes of dust."

David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"Some say that you should turn your face from the light of the moon. They say it makes you mad.I turn my face towards it and I laugh.Make me mad, I whisper. Go on, make Mina mad.I laugh again.Some people think that she's already mad, I think."

David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"A school for the writing of nonsense and the pursuit of extraordinary activities."

David Almond, My Name Is Mina

"In the end she just said..... All I did was to run away for a few minutes! All I wanted was to be free!"

David Almond, My Name Is Mina