“As so often happens when scientists quarrel, a lay audience is left to choose their preferred fairy tale”

“Yesterday's fairy tale is today's fact. The magician is only one step ahead of his audience.”

“When we think about fairy tales, we think about happily ever afters, forgetting the darkness that stories beginning with "once upon a time" so often contain.I tried to protect Shay from that darkness. But there was no way to shield her from the truth: Life is not a fairy tale.”

“at the center of every fairy tale lay a truth that gave the story its power.”

“This is what really happens when fairy tales exist. There is nothing magical or enchanting about it, my dear.”

“Do people choose the art that inspires them — do they think it over, decide they might prefer the fabulous to the real? For me, it was those early readings of fairy tales that made me who I was as a reader and, later on, as a storyteller.”