Masquerade

Oh foolish child, don’t you know?

A broken heart will never mend...

A true love story has no end...  

 

Mimi and Jack

	Azrael and Abbadon
	Azrael
	Abbadon

	Blue Bloods
	Masquerade
	Revelations
	The Van Alen Legacy

They're gathered in circles
the lamps light their faces
The crescent moon rocks in the sky
The poets of drumming
keep heartbeats suspended
The smoke swirls up and then it dies


Would you like my mask?
would you like my mirror?
cries the man in the shadowing hood
You can look at yourself
you can look at each other
or you can look at the face, the face of your god


The stories are woven
and fortunes are told
The truth is measured by the weight of your gold
The magic lies scattered
on rugs on the ground
Faith is conjured in the night market's sound


Would you like my mask?
would you like my mirror?
cries the man in the shadowing hood
You can look at yourself
you can look at each other
or you can look at the face, the face of your god


The lessons are written
on parchments of paper
They're carried by horse from the river Nile
says the shadowy voice
In the firelight, the cobra
is casting the flame a winsome smile


Would you like my mask?
would you like my mirror?
cries the man in the shadowing hood
You can look at yourself
you can look at each other
or you can look at the face, the face of your god

http://www.carlosruizzafon.co.uk/angel-music.html

'The whole of Barcelona stretched out at my feet and I wanted to believe that, when I opened those windows, its streets would whisper stories to me, secrets I could capture on paper and narrate to whoever cared to listen.'

In an abandoned mansion at the heart of Barcelona, a young man, David Martín, makes his living by writing sensationalist novels under a pseudonym. The survivor of a troubled childhood, he has taken refuge in the world of books, and spends his nights spinning baroque tales about the city's underworld. But perhaps his dark imaginings are not as strange as they seem, for in a locked room deep within the house lie photographs and letters hinting at the mysterious death of the previous owner.

Like a slow poison, the history of the place seeps into his bones as he struggles with an impossible love. Close to despair, David receives a letter from a reclusive French editor, Andreas Corelli, who makes him the offer of a lifetime. He is to write a book unlike anything that has existed - a book with the power to change hearts and minds. In return, he will receive a fortune, perhaps more. But as David begins the work, he realises that there is a connection between this haunting book and the shadows that surround his home.

Set in the turbulent 1920s, THE ANGEL'S GAME takes us back to the gothic universe of the Cemetery of the Forgotten Books, the Sempere & Son bookshop, and the winding streets of Barcelona's old quarter, in a masterful tale about the magic of books and the darkest corners of the human soul.

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind."

"Dance like no one is watching. Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt and live like it's heaven on Earth."

"Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened."

"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe."

"Be the change that you wish to see in the world."

"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away."

"A room without books is like a body without a soul."

"Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent."

"You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams."

"If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything."

"Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

"I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can't handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best."

"So many books, so little time."

"You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough"

"Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever."

"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying."

"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read."

"Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: "What! You too? I thought I was the only one."

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."

"Whenever I feel the need to exercise, I lie down until it goes away."

"In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on."

"All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by frost."

"To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment."

"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect."

"The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid."

"Never put off until tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow."

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye."

"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."

"There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."
"A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you."

"A day without sunshine is like, you know, night."

"That which does not kill us makes us stronger."

"Without music, life would be a mistake."

"Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much."

"Be Yourself; everyone else is already taken."

"Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That's why we call it 'The Present'."

"Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. "

"Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction."

"None of us really changes over time. We only become more fully what we are."

"In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.""

"All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."

"Evil is always possible. And goodness is eternally difficult."

"Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them."

"Freethinkers are those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their own customs, privileges, or beliefs. This state of mind is not common, but it is essential for right thinking..."

"In the very depths of Hell, do not demons love one another?"

"A man can live and be healthy without killing animals for food; therefore, if he eats meat, he participates in taking animal life merely for the sake of his appetite. And to act so is immoral."

The story opens in Amsterdam in 1972, when a teenage girl discovers a medieval book and a cache of yellowed letters in her diplomat father's library. The pages of the book are empty except for a woodcut of a dragon. The letters are addressed to: "My dear and unfortunate successor." When the girl confronts her father, he reluctantly confesses an unsettling story: his involvement, twenty years earlier, in a search for his graduate school mentor, who disappeared from his office only moments after confiding to Paul his certainty that Dracula--Vlad the Impaler, an inventively cruel ruler of Wallachia in the mid-15th century--was still alive. The story turns out to concern our narrator directly because Paul's collaborator in the search was a fellow student named Helen Rossi (the unacknowledged daughter of his mentor) and our narrator's long-dead mother, about whom she knows almost nothing. And then her father, leaving just a note, disappears also.

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

The Ring follows a young New York lawyer who receives two rings -- one
from her fiancé and one that will lead her on an
unforgettable adventure.
On her twenty-seventh birthday, New York lawyer Cristina Wilson receives a diamond engagement ring from her fiancé, Mike, a wealthy stockbroker. Later that day, a messenger from Barcelona delivers a beautiful antique jewel, a ruby set in bone, from a mysterious sender. Cristina wears them both, unaware that they are incompatible. The ruby soon works its mysterious effects, giving her strange and unsettling dreams.
Cristina is swept away to Spain to attend the reading of her godfather's will, where she reunites with her first love, Oriol, and soon the powerful attraction that once overwhelmed them in their adolescent years is rekindled. Together Cristina and Oriol embark on an odyssey in search of a Templar treasure that has remained hidden for centuries in a place that only they can uncover. From New York lawyer to intrepid adventurer, Cristina experiences a profound journey of love, life, and death as she learns an unforgettable lesson that could redirect the course of her destiny.

In 1492, when Ferdinand and Isabella expel the Jews from Spain, six year old Esther Sarfati finds herself travelling to Rome to join her father, a successful banker who has helped his fellow Spaniard, Rodrigo Borgia, finance his bid for the Papacy. Nine years later, as Pope Alexander VI, he repays the favour by offering Esther a place in the household of his daughter, Lucrezia, who is about to marry Alfonso d'Este, heir to the Duchy of Ferrara. Against her own better judgement, but in accordance with her father's wishes for her future, Esther converts to Christianity and enters Lucrezia's service as lady-in-waiting. Flattered by Lucrezia's favour, seduced by the friendship of her cousin, Angela Borgia and swept off her feet by Lucrezia's glamorous and dangerous brother, Cesare, she is drawn into a web of intrigue and deceit which will test her heart to its utmost and burden her with secrets she must carry to her grave. Set against the glittering background of the court of Ferrara in the early sixteenth century, this is the heart-breaking story of what happens to an innocent abroad in the world of the Borgias.

The year is 1919 and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle must investigate the murder of his mentor (and founder of the The Arcanum), Konstantin Duvall. To do so he must reunite the scattered members of the Arcanum; Harry Houdini, H. P. Lovecraft, and voodoo queen Marie Laveau. Doyle finds himself embroiled in a story of war as old as time itself, for possession of the world’s most powerful—now missing—artifact: the Book of Enoch, the chronicle of God’s mistakes, within whose pages lie the seeds for the end of everything. Peopled with the twentieth century’s most famous—and infamous—figures, the stakes go beyond the realm of humankind—into the divine.

Ab extra ~ From beyond
Actus reus ~ Guilty act
Ad lucem ~ To the light
Ad mortem ~ To death
Alter ego ~ Other I
Amor fati ~ Love of fate
Amor vincit omnia ~ Love conquers all
Ars longa vita brevis ~ Art is long, life is short
Audi alteram partem ~ Hear the other side
Aut viam inveniam aut faciam ~ Either I shall find a way, or I shall make one
Carpe diem ~ Seize the day
Casus belli ~ Event of war or Cause of war
Caveat lector ~ Let the reader beware
Cogito ergo sum ~ I think, therefore I am.
Curriculum vitae ~ Course of life
De facto ~ In fact
De jure ~ By law
Dies Irae ~ Day of Wrath
Dum spiro spero ~ While I breathe, I hope
Fortes fortuna adiuvat ~ Fortune favours the bold
Hic sunt dracones ~ Here there are dragons
In medias res ~ Into the middle of things
In memoriam ~ Into the memory
Magna cum laude ~ With great praise
Mea Culpa ~ My Fault
Memento mori ~ Remember that [you will] die
Meminerunt omnia amantes ~ Lovers remember all
Mors tua vita mea ~ Your death, my life
Mors vincit omnia ~ Death conquers all" or "death always wins
Nosce te ipsum ~ Know thyself
Opus Dei ~ The Work of God
Veritas ~ Truth
Vince malum bono ~ Overcome Evil with Good
Contra veritas ~ Against the truth
Mala fides ~ Bad faith

http://www.carlosruizzafon.co.uk/shadow-music.html

~Every book, every volume you see here has a soul. The soul of the person who wrote it and of those who read it and lived and dreamed with it.

~...few things leave a deeper mark on a reader than the first book that finds its way into his heart. Those first images, the echo of words we think have left behind, accompany us throughout our lives and sculpt a palace in our memory ...

~Nobody knows much about women, not even Freud, not even women themselves. But it's like electricity: you don't have to know how it works to get a shock on the fingers.

~Presents are made for the pleasure of who gives them, not for the merits of who receives them.

~We exist as long as somebody remembers us.

~Books are mirrors: you only see in them what you already have inside you.

~A secret's worth depends on the people from which it must be kept.

~This is a place of mystery...a sanctuary. Every book, every volume you see here has a soul. The soul of the person who wrote it and of those who read it and lived and dreamed with it. Every time a book changes hands, every time someone runs his eyes down its pages, its spirit grows and strengthens.

~Some things can only be seen in the shadows.

~Look, Daniel. Destiny is usually around the corner. Like a thief, like a hooker, or a lottery vendor: its three most common personifications. But what destiny does not do is home visits. You have to go for it."

Plot: The novel, set in post- Spanish Civil War Barcelona, concerns a young boy, Daniel. Just after the war, Daniel's father takes him to the secret Cemetery of Forgotten Books, a huge library of old, forgotten titles lovingly preserved by a select few initiates. According to tradition, everyone initiated to this secret place is allowed to take one book from it, and must protect it for life. Daniel selects a book called The Shadow of the Wind by Julián Carax. That night he takes the book home and reads it, completely engrossed. Daniel then attempts to look for other books by this unknown author, but can find none. All he comes across are stories of a strange man - calling himself Laín Coubert, after a character in the book who happens to be the Devil - who has been seeking out Carax's books for decades, buying them all and burning them. In time this mysterious figure confronts and threatens Daniel. Terrified, Daniel returns the book to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books but continues to seek out the story of the elusive author. In doing so Daniel becomes entangled in an age old conflict that began with the author himself. Many parallels are found to exist between the author's life and Daniel's and he takes it upon himself to make sure history does not repeat.

I no longer need anything
now that you light me up with a huge love outside and inside
Believe me if you can, believe me if you want
Believe me and you'll see that it will never end
I have desires who fly, written above
every thought of mine is independent of my body
Believe me if you can, believe me because
it could only hurt me again
There, big spaces, and then us,
open skies that don't close anymore
We need to live around here
You make me live without fear
Must it be in a lifetime or in a hour
Don't let fly away or disappear
My own world, now it's open, please
You make me live without shame
Even if you have the whole world against you
Leave appearances and take senses
and listen to what I’ve got inside of me
In this way, you become a big painting
that inside of me,
recovers a white wall, a little faded
Believe me if you can
Believe me because it could only hurt me again
Here between all the things I have
I’m owning something more that I never had before
you need to make me live more
You've opened in me fantasy
and hopes for days of boundless happiness
You took me
You made me your queen,
you frame me and then you move me according to your mood
You make me live without fear
even if you have the whole world against you
Leave appearances, take senses
and listen to what I’ve got inside of me

Vivimi-Laura Pausini

 

~Once Upon a Thyme by zensho

~Heart of Ice by Dreaming One

~We'll Always Have Paris by Melissa D

~Their Room by aleximoon

~Bad Faith by Morrighan256

~Krum Do I Love? by yael

~Unwanted Bonds by Penelope

~The Bleeding of October by Penelope(sequel to Unwanted Bonds)

~El Tango De Roxanne by Fira Black-Malfoy

~Courting Miss Granger by marmaladefever

~Dreaming in Crimson by Tabbycat

~Divine Humiliation by zarahjoyce

~Memoirs of a Dragon Lover by SometimesAngel

~Draco Malfoy The Amazing Bouncing Rat by maya

~A Act of Love by Elisha

~A Act of Love: The Sequel by Elisha

~Finding Out How by angel89

~A Dowry of a Single Galleon by Krissy/bunney

~Twelfth Use Of Dragon's Blood by Wonderland Toy

~10 Ways to Kill Draco Malfoy by Drakulya

~A World Apart by lolagirl

~Somnio Eternus by finally-defeated

~Unbelievably by DanishGirl

~Bound to you(Sequel to Unbelievably)

~Future Parents Program by Avari20

~Scales and a Tail by Halfling

~Arabian Knight by Jada Rene

~Future Flower by Jada Rene

~Meant to Be by annie

~To Marry a Mudblood by m1s7ress

~Nostalgic Notions by DracoDew17

~The Rest of Their Lives by smuggled-muggle

~Transi de Froid by Incitata

~A Night At The Movies  by Honeybees

~Hermione Malfoy by superscar

~Sometimes I need what only you can provide: your absence.
- Ashleigh Brilliant

~It's always darkest before it turns absolutely pitch black.
- Paul Newman

~It's a catastrophic success.

~I feel so miserable without you; it's almost like having you here.
- Stephen Bishop

~War doesn't determine who's right, only who's left...

~History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.
- Abba Eban

~I never forget a face, but in your case I'll be glad to make an exception.
~I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book.
~I have had a perfectly wonderful evening, but this wasn't it.

~He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.

~I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.

~If you ever become a mother, can I have one of the puppies?
- Charles Pierce

~Kids in the back seats cause accidents, accidents in the back seat cause kids

~Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victems he intends to eat until he eats them.
- Samuel Butler

~I believe in luck: how else can you explain the success of those you don't like?
- Jean Cocteau

~A good listener is usually thinking about something else.
- Kin Hubbard

~Every time I look at you I get a fierce desire to be lonesome.
- Oscar Levant

~Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in memory as the wish to forget it.
- Montaigne

~When ideas fail, words come in very handy. - Goethe

~Stupidity is not a crime, so you're free to go 

~I think, Therefore we have nothing in common 

~If I agreed with you, we'd both be wrong 

~He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.

~Every One Has The Right To Be Stupid But You're Abusing the Privilege 

~Don't blame yourself. Let me do it 

~Thou shalt not weigh more than thy refrigerator 

~Why be difficult, when with a bit of effort, you can be impossible? 

~Let's share, you’ll take the grenade, I'll take the pin 

~That which doesn't kill you, will just try harder tomorrow 

~I hear voices and they don't like you 

~Those who laugh last thinks slowest 

~ Fred and George, however, found all this very funny. They went out of their way to march ahead of Harry down the corridors, shouting, "Make way for the Heir of Slytherin, seriously evil wizard coming through..."

~ Harry's fine, he's down in the Chamber of Secrets having tea with his fanged servent...

~ "No - no - no!" someone was shouting. "No! Fred! No!"
And Percy was shaking his brother, and Ron was kneeling beside them, and Fred's eyes stared without seeing, the ghost of his last laugh still etched upon his face.

~ Ron: “Sure you’re not thinking of Gorgovitch?”
Harry: “Who?”
“Dragomir Gorgovitch, Chaser, transferred to the Chudley Cannons for a record fee two years ago. Record holder for most Quaffle drops in a season.”
“No,” said Harry. “I’m definitely not thinking of Gorgovitch.
“I try not to either,” said Ron.

 

~ "I don't go looking for trouble. Trouble usually finds me."

 

~ "Are you insane? Of course I want to leave the Dursleys! Have you got a house? When can I move in?"

 

~ "Well, I don't know how to break this to you, but I think they might have noticed we broke into Gringotts."

~ "I hope you're pleased with yourselves. We could all have been killed - or worse, expelled. Now if you don't mind, I'm going to bed."

~ Fred looked across the hall at the poltergeist bobbing on his level above the crowd.
"Give her hell from us, Peeves."
And Peeves, whom Harry had never seen take an order from a student before, swept his belled hat from his head and sprang to a salute as Fred and George wheeled about to tumultuous applause from the students below and sped out of the open front doors into the glorious sunset.

~ "Has Ron saved a goal yet?" asked Hermione.
"Well, he can do it if he thinks no one is watching him," said Fred, rolling his eyes. "So all we have to do is ask the crowd to turn their backs and talk among themselves every time the Quaffle goes up on his end Saturday."

~ "You don't want to bottle your anger up like that, Harry, let it all out," said Fred, beaming. "There might be a couple people fifty miles away who didn't hear you."

~ "--but you get these massive pus-filled boils too," said George, "and we haven't worked out how to get rid of them yet."
"I can't see any boils," said Ron, staring at the twins.
"No, well, you wouldn't," said Fred, "they're not in a place we generally display to the public --"
"-- but they make sitting on a broom a right pain in the --"

~ "Hey, look - Harry's got a Weasley sweater, too!" Fred and George were wearing blue sweaters, one with a large yellow 'F' on it, the other a 'G.'
"Harry's is better than ours, though," said Fred, holding up Harry's sweater. "She obviously makes more of an effort if you're not family."
"Why aren't you wearing yours, Ron?" George demanded. "Come on, get it on, they're lovely and warm."
"I hate maroon," Ron moaned half-heartedly as he pulled it over his head.
"You haven't got a letter on yours," George observed. "I suppose she thinks you don't forget your name. But we're not stupid - we know we're called Gred and Forge."

~ "You're a prefect? Oh Ronnie! That's everyone in the family!" [Molly Weasley]
"What are Fred and I? Next door neighbours?"

~ "So top grade's O for 'Outstanding,'" she [Hermione] was saying, "and then there's A-"
"No, E," George corrected her, "E for 'Exceeds Expectations.' And I've always thought Fred and I should've got E in everything, because we exceeded expectations just by turning up for the exams."

~ "Well, I certainly don't," said Percy sanctimoniously. "I shudder to think what the state of my in-tray would be if I was away from work for five days."
"Yeah, someone might slip dragon dung in it again, eh, Perce?" said Fred.
"That was a sample of fertilizer from Norway!" said Percy, going very red in the face. "It was nothing personal!"
"It was," Fred whispered to Harry as they got up from the table. "We sent it."

~ "This isn't how we imagined handing over our present," said George grimly, putting down a large wrapped gift on Ron's bedside cabinet and sitting beside Ginny.
"Yeah, when we pictured the scene, he was conscious," said Fred.

~ “For instance, this new idea that You-Know-Who can kill with a single glance from his eyes. That’s a basilisk, listeners. One simple test: Check whether the thing that’s glaring at you has got legs. If it has, it’s safe to look into its eyes, although if it really is You-Know-Who, that’s still likely to be the last thing you ever do.” [Fred]

~ "Well, I can certainly see why we're trying to keep them alive. Who wouldn't want pets that can burn, sting, and bite all at once?"

~ "Longbottom, if brains were gold, you'd be poorer than Weasley, and that's saying something."

~ "Azkaban - the wizard's prison, Goyle. Honestly, if you were any slower, you'd be going backwards."

 

~ "You'd better hurry up, they'll be waiting for 'the Chosen Captain'-- 'The Boy Who Scored'-- whatever they call you these days."

 

~ "Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic far beyond all we do here! And now, bedtime. Off you trot!"

 

~ "If you made a better rat than a human, that's not much to boast about."

 

~ "This is how it is - this is why you're not in the Order - you don't understand - there are things worth dying for!"

~ "You have a habit of turning up in unexpected places, Potter, and you are very rarely there for no good reason."

~ "The Dark Lord, for instance, almost always knows when somebody is lying to him. Only those skilled at Occlumency are able to shut down those feelings and memories that contradict the lie, and to utter falsehoods in his presence without detection."

~ "Oh, very good," interrupted Snape, his lip curling. "Yes, it is easy to see that nearly six years of magical education have not been wasted on you, Potter. 'Ghosts are transparent.'"

~ "Ah, of course. There is no need to tell me any more, Ms. Granger. Which one of you will be dying this year?"

~ "Really, Severus," said Professor McGonagall sharply. "I see no reason to stop the boy playing Quidditch. This cat wasn't hit over the head with a broomstick. There is no evidence at all that Potter has done anything wrong."

~ "Well, usually when a person shakes their head," said McGonagall coldly, "they mean 'no.' So unless Miss Edgecombe is using a form of sign language as yet unknown to humans --"