Top 100 Darren Shan Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Real life’s nasty. It’s cruel. It doesn’t care about heroes and happy endings and the way things should be. In real life, bad things happen. People die. Fights are lost. Evil often wins.”

— Darren Shan

2. “It is too easy to say ‘what if’ and paint a picture of a perfect world.”

— Darren Shan

3. “Even in death may you triumphant.”

— Darren Shan

4. “There are some things in life we can never understand, things we are better off not understanding.”

— Darren Shan

5. “That’s what you taught me – we don’t have to accept destiny or Des Tiny. We can create our own future, all of us. We have the power to rule our lives – we just have to make the choice to use it.”

— Darren Shan

6. “The thing about real life is, when you do something stupid, it normally costs you.”

— Darren Shan

7. “A world without pain, loss, betrayal, hate, death, loneliness? Impossible!”

— Darren Shan

8. “Even a minute of dying is better than an eternity of nothingness.”

— Darren Shan

9. “I won’t die. I won’t give those ghouls the pleasure. I’ll live and grow strong. I’ll escape, then hunt them down and make them suffer.”

— Darren Shan

10. “Power always impresses the young and foolish.”

— Darren Shan

11. “But stories don’t end. They continue as long as you’re alive. You just have to get on with things. Turn the page, start a new chapter, find out what’s in store for you next, and keep your fingers crossed that it’s not too awful. Even if you know in your heart and soul that it most probably will be.”

— Darren Shan

12. “The demons were scary, but girls – Well, girls are really terrifying.”

— Darren Shan

13. “For a long time that’s all I could do, howl and scream and cry like the wild animal of the night that I’d become.”

— Darren Shan

14. “Underneath me, Sam Grest – who’d been my friend and saved my life – lay perfectly still and slipped further and further into the final sleep of an unfair and horrible death.”

— Darren Shan

15. “The easy way is not always the right way.”

— Darren Shan

16. “Destiny’s what you make of it. You have to face whatever life throws at you.”

— Darren Shan

17. “We all make basic assumptions about things in life, but sometimes those assumptions are WRONG. We must never trust in what we assume, only in what we KNOW.”

— Darren Shan

18. “I don’t like it, but my hands are tied. I just want you to know this: if I ever get the chance to betray you, I will. If the opportunity arises to pay you back, I’ll take it. You’ll never be able to trust me.”

— Darren Shan

19. “But in life we don’t usually get to choose the time of our defining moments. We just have to stand and face them when they come, no matter what sort of a state we’re in.”

— Darren Shan

20. “Students never appreciate their teachers while they are learning. It is only later, when they know more of the world, that they understand how indebted they are to those who instructed them. Good teachers expect no praise or love from the young. They wait for it, and in time, it comes.”

— Darren Shan

21. “But the universe isn’t fair. Things don’t work out neatly, pain, hardship and challenges divided equally among those best equipped to deal with them. Sometimes individuals have to be Atlases and carry the weight of the world alone. It shouldn’t happen that way, but it does.”

— Darren Shan

22. “Better not to start down a wrong path at all than head down it in the hope of making a detour when something better came along.”

— Darren Shan

23. “There are a lot of black-hearted, mean-spirited bastards in the world. It’s important that we hold them to acount. But always remember that you might be the most black-hearted and mean-spirited in the lot, so hold yourself the most accountable of all.”

— Darren Shan

24. “Crooked, grasping, evil-hearted people were easy to find. Honest, concerned, self-sacrificing people were harder to come by.”

— Darren Shan

25. “Failure is always a bitter pill to swallow,” Mr. Crepsley said.”

— Darren Shan

26. “No. You know this is wrong and you want to feel better about it. You don’t want to admit your as ruthless and monstrous as the demons you claim to hate.”

— Darren Shan

27. “Wars raged everywhere as men found new, inventive ways to kill even more of their race. It was like a contest, the many tribes of mankind competing to see who could commit the worst atrocities.”

— Darren Shan

28. “Confidence has brought them out into the light, but they seem to have forgotten – light’s no good for creatures of the night.”

— Darren Shan

29. “I gulped, then stepped over the threshold into the house where I’d lived as a boy. After eighteen long years of wandering, I had finally come home.”

— Darren Shan

30. “You don’t recognise the good times in life until it all goes bad and you look back and see how lucky you were, how easy you had things.”

— Darren Shan

31. “A man should know when it is time to step aside.”

— Darren Shan

32. “If mankind’s destined to bite the bullet, let’s bite it and be damned.”

— Darren Shan

33. “You do not have to be alone. The world never inflicts loneliness upon us. That is something we choose or reject by ourselves.”

— Darren Shan

34. “The world won’t end with a bang or a whimper. It’ll end with the death screams of a thousand demons and a defiant, carefree, savage, wolfen howl.”

— Darren Shan

35. “They forget that the vampaneze were once our brothers, that by destroying them, we destroy a part of ourselves. Most vampire never realize how pointless and savage war truly is. You were smart enough to see through the truth. Don’t ever forget it.”

— Darren Shan

36. “He says every story has at least some truth in it, even if most are made up.”

— Darren Shan

37. “Childhood is the purest state. The pure of heart never leave it behind. Their life merely takes them on a cirtuitous route away from, and then back to it.”

— Darren Shan

38. “I know who the demon thief is – it’s me!”

— Darren Shan

39. “Jangan biarkan kebencian menguasai hidupmu. Kematianku tidak perlu dibalaskan. Hiduplah sebagai vampir yang bebas, bukan sebagai makhluk putus asa gila dan terobsesi untuk membalas dendam.”

— Darren Shan

40. “The moon’s a powerful mistress. She can reach through any wall or covering and work her wicked charms.”

— Darren Shan

41. “Now sod off back to your own world, you motherless scum, and save your threats for those who care.”

— Darren Shan

42. “I’d like to do something to help the worst afflicted, but I can’t. It’s not possible to save everybody. Even heroes have their all-too-human limits.”

— Darren Shan

43. “The hands of fate keep time on a heart-shaped clock.”

— Darren Shan

44. “It is good to be taught humility when we are young. If we do not exeperience pain as children, we will cause pain as adults.”

— Darren Shan

45. “If you were a girl... I’d kiss you!”

— Darren Shan

46. “You can’t hate those who are harming themselves. Instead you pity them and try to help them if you can.”

— Darren Shan

47. “Destiny is a tower of cards – nudge one just an inch and everything stacked on top comes crashing down. P116.”

— Darren Shan

48. “Trust one fool to see no flaws in another!”

— Darren Shan

49. “For an hour or more he was neither human nor vampire, just a howling, hungry creature of dark delights.”

— Darren Shan

50. “I’m starting to understand that fear is like cancer – you can beat it back, but if it returns, it can be worse than ever.”

— Darren Shan