I think that most of us, anyway, read these stories that we know are not "true" because we're hungry for another kind of truth: the mythic truth about human nature in general, the particular truth about those life-communities that define our own identity, and the most specific truth of all: our own self-story. Fiction, because it is not about someone who lived in the real world, always has the possibility of being about oneself. --From the Introduction

I'm not a liar, sir,' she said. "'No, I'm sure you sincerely become whatever it is you're pretending to be.

Where loyalty bound creatures together, they became something larger, something new and whole and inexplicable.

Because never in my entire childhood did I feel like a child. I felt like a person all along―the same person that I am today.

Others find humanity by looking in their own hearts. Only lost souls need to search for it outside themselves.

Working is hard and distracts from having fun.

He could see Bonzo's anger growing hot. Hot anger was bad. Ender's anger was cold, and he could use it. Bonzo's was hot, and so it used him.