There Is Cruelty In The World Eliza,

I Think I'm Just Breathing, That's All. And There's A Difference Between Breathing And Being Alive.

With The Adult Ones, I Feel I Need To Get As Deep Inside The Psychology Of A Character As I Can, And That Needs To Be First-person. In The Children's Books, I Feel I Need Some Distance. I Don't Want To Be The Nine-year-old At The Center Of The Story. I Need To Have Some Type Of Narrative Voice.

Very Slowly He Turned His Head Back To Look At Shmuel, Who Wasn't Crying Anymore, Merely Staring At The Floor And Looking As If He Was Trying To Convince His Soul Not To Live Inside His Tiny Body Anymore, But To Slip Away And Sail To The Door And Rise Up Into The Sky, Gliding Through The Clouds Until It Was Very Far Away.'' -the Boy In The Striped Pajamas

And I Have Tried To Forget Him, I Have Tried To Convince Myself That It Was Just One Of Those Things, But It’s Difficult To Do That When My Body Is Standing Here, Eight Feet Deep In The Earth Of Northern France, While My Heart Remains By A Stream In A Clearing In England Where I Left It Weeks Ago.

Do You See The Irony At All, Tristan?’ I Stare At Him And Shake My Head. He Seems Determined Not To Speak Again Until I Do. ‘what Irony?’ I Ask Eventually, The Words Tumbling Out In A Hurried Heap. ‘that I Am To Be Shot As A Coward While You Get To Live As One.