The Neverending Story is a German fantasy novel by Michael Ende, first published in 1979. The standard English translation, by Ralph Manheim, was first published in 1983. The novel was later adapted into several films.

The majority of the story takes place in the parallel world of Fantastica (Phantásien in the original German version; referred to as Fantasia in the films), a world being destroyed by the Nothing, which represents and constitutes people's lack of imagination in the real world. The first protagonist is a young warrior, who is asked by the sick Empress to set off and find the cure for their world. The other protagonist is a boy from the real world, a reader of the novel with the same title, for whom the story gradually becomes more and more realistic.

The book centers on a boy, Bastian Balthazar Bux, who is neglected by his father (who has sunken into despair after having lost his wife) and is bullied by his schoolmates. While running from some of them, Bastian bursts into the antique book store of Carl Conrad Coreander. Bastian steals a book from the store called The Neverending Story which Coreander has been reading; he hides in his school's attic, where he proceeds to read the story through the rest of the day and the night, not realizing that he has effectively become a part of it.

The book begins in Fantastica, when a "will-o'-the-wisp" goes to ask the Childlike Empress for help against the Nothing, which is spreading over the land. The Empress is ill, which is believed to be the cause of the Nothing (or vice versa); she sends the only person that can stop the Nothing, a boy warrior named Atreyu, to find a cure for her. Atreyu is a brave person, being considered a man even though he is a young boy of Bastian's age.

Bastian sets out to find his own true wish - the only thing he can wish for without losing himself. After losing his remaining memories, Atreyu helps him, and Bastian then has his one true wish fulfilled and manages to cure his father as well. After he returns home, he decides to return the book to its owner, Carl Conrad Coreander, but the book disappears after Bastian returns from Fantastica. He explains this to Carl Conrad Coreander, who is interested in Bastian's adventures - he has been to Fantastica himself once, as it turns out - and asks him to keep in touch to talk about their respective experiences. As Bastian leaves to meet his father, Coreander muses that Bastian will indeed help others to get to Fantastica and help carry over more hopes into the human world.