Stories About Stars

"Her [Hulan's] always ended with some sort of hero popping up and marrying an ugly animal who then turned out to be a kind and beautiful prince.  I think mine had to do with lessons learned too late- not to eat too much, not to talk to loud, not to wander out at night late by yourself- in any case, always people who fell off the earth and into the sky because of their willful ways."
- The Kitchen God's Wife by Amy Tan on page 230

The quote above is Winnie looking back on the stories that she and Hulan made up about the different patterns of stars that they saw in the sky.  The stories they make up encompass their hopes, dreams, and even parts of their realities at the time.
Hulan's story encompasses her reality because she married the man who originally would not help her sister, the girl who he had gotten pregnant.  An ugly animal compares Hulan's first impression of her husband to an animal in a fairy tale.  Then, she ends up marrying this man who redirects her poor life style to a wealthier one he pays for.  Later in the novel, the reader learns how much Hulan despises the thought of herself being poor.  Since her husband took Hulan away from her despised life of being poor and made her rich, she probably believed this to be an act of kindness so this man can be compared to a prince.
Winnie's stories were about lessons that she didn't learn on time.  This reflects her relationship with Wen Fu.  The other examples she lists are probably stories she read or heard when she was little.  One of the lines that stands out to me is the last one.  This line states her fears.  In other words, Winnie is scared that if she is willful or stubborn, she will end up in an unknown and mysterious place which scares her.  This might be a reason for why she did not stand up to Wen Fu until much later in her life.
Keeping this section in the novel was clever of Amy Tan because it reminds the audience of the lives that the two characters have lived so far.  How much of our own creativities reflect our hopes, dreams, and lives?