“...that's the way to tell a true story from a made-up one. A made-up story always has a neat and tidy end. But true stories don't end, at least until their heroes and heroines die, and not then really because the things they did and didn't do, sometimes live on.”

“I asked her what a true story was because I thought that all stories were made up. She said a true story was called fact, and a made-up story was called ficton. Auntie May said a made-up story is a bit like telling lies, only the people who read them knew that already and so it didn’t matter”

“Mom, why couldn't my story, my real life story have a happy ending - like in the books?""No true love story has a happy ending; one always must die and leave the other. So there's never a totally happy ending.”

“Stories don't always have happy endings."This stopped him. Because they didn't, did they? That's one thing the monster had definitely taught him. Stories were wild, wild animals and went off in directions you couldn't expect.”

“[Life] wasn't a fairy tale, and it didn't have a happy ending--but then again, no story did. In the end everybody dies... But you can be happy right up until the last page...”

“in the story no one smiles,no lesson is learned.the narrator can not change any one's heartthe story is agate to another story,which opens onto a story after that. i made it up but the story is true.”