stories

When your share your story with someone, it becomes their story too.

The African continent has so many stories to tell, it's about time they are told, by them - not us.

Everyone who tells a story tells it differently, just to remind us that everybody sees it differently

A dessert to a deserter in the desert burst, "You trust your thirst. And you are too hot! You scream for ice cream. And believe it or not, I may not be your first. But I might be your lust! Give it a shot...

All the great stories are about obsession and people who are obsessed.

Stories shape the world.

To be fair to them, they were only after something that walled them off from the past and from people in general, not something that offered any connection that might prove painful or human. Thet wanted stories, I came to realise, in which they were already imprisoned, not stories in which they appeared along with the storyteller, accomplices in escaping.

Had she believed all that? Old Pilar's folklore? No, not really; or not exactly. Most likely Pilar hadn't quite believed it either, but it was a reassuring story: that the dead were not entirely dead but were alive in a different way; a paler way admittedly, and somewhat darker. But still able to send messages, if only such messages could be recognized and deciphered. People need such stories, Pilar said once, because however dark, a darkness with voices in it is better than a silent void.

Do you ever wonder about the fairy tales of life?

Talent and work ethic are nothing without belief.

But the truth is that no person ever understands another, from beginning to end of life, there is no truth that can be known, only the story we imagine to be true, the story they really believe to be true about themselves; and all of them lies.

God doesn__ put that much prep into something that is insignificant.

Three rules to obey!1. Don't be over-impressed by your past glories! 2. Don't be scared by your future stories!3. Be hopeful to get out of today's miseries!

Don__ let the poison of the past spoil a fruitful future.

Someone needs to tell those tales. When the battles are fought and won and lost, when the pirates find their treasures and the dragons eat their foes for breakfast with a nice cup of Lapsang souchong, someone needs to tell their bits of overlapping narrative. There's magic in that. It's in the listener, and for each and every ear it will be different, and it will affect them in ways they can never predict. From the mundane to the profound. You may tell a tale that takes up residence in someone's soul, becomes their blood and self and purpose. That tale will move them and drive them and who knows what they might do because of it, because of your words. That is your role, your gift. Your sister may be able to see the future, but you yourself can shape it, boy. Do not forget that... there are many kinds of magic, after all.

Give a hundred writers the same idea and you'll get a hundred different stories.

As a writer, I see the saga of your life in a single glimpse. It may be inaccurate, but my version doesn't lack for creativity.

To imagine is to spark beauty in our thoughts.