Dean Koontz

“In memory, she lived and moved and laughed, but all that a photograph could offer was one frozen moment of a life.”

“Perseverance is impossible if we don't permit ourselves to hope.”

“Man, I like you. I wish you could like me.”

“People sometimes speak in code, often without realizing they are doing so, as much a mystery to themselves as others.”

“Narcissists are everywhere in this ripe age of self-love, which amazes me because so much in life would seem to foster humility. Each of us is a potential source of foolishness, each of us must endure the consequences of the foolishness of others, and in addition to all of that, Nature frequently works to impress upon us our absurdity and thereby remind us that we are not the masters of the universe that we like to suppose we are. - Odd Thomas - Odd Apocalypse by Dean Koontz pg 62 chapter 8”

“Even with the intention to be quiet, human beings seldom can restrain from comment or at least grumbled cursing; we are the chattering species, as much as we are anything else - Odd Thomas - Odd Apocalypse by Dean Koontz pg 56 chapter 7”

“Chyna Shepherd, untouched and alive and able to pee.”

“Between birth and burial, we find ourselves in a comedy of mysteries. If you don't think life is mysterious, if you believe you have it all mapped out, you aren't paying attention or you've anesthetized yourself with booze or drugs, or with a comforting ideology. And if you don't think life's a comedy - well, friend, you might as well hurry along to that burial. The rest of us need people with whom we can laugh.”

“The sun was hardly risen, but already time was running out.”

“Eccentricity is the universal trait of humanity.”

“we must seize life because we never know how much of it remains for us, that faith is the antidote to despair and that laughter is the music of faith.”

“Hope, however, isn't all that's needed to achieve change. Hope is a hand extended, but two hands are required to be pulled out of this deep hole. The second hand was faith...”

“There's lots of law these days, but not much justice. Celebrities murder their wives and go free. A mother kills her children, and the news people on TV say she's the victim and want you to send money to her lawyers. When everything's upside down like this, what fool just sits back and thinks justice will prevail?”

“Anger was a reliable defense, but one that allowed no chance of final victory. Anger was a medicine but never a cure, briefly numbing the pain without extracting the thorn that caused the agony.”

“...a wasted opportunity wasn't just a missed chance, but was a wound to your future. Miss too many opportunities, thus sustaining too many wounds, and you wouldn't have a future at all.”

“The world is full of broken people. Splints, casts, miracle drugs, and time can't mend fractured hearts, wounded hearts, wounded minds, torn spirits.”

“Maybe it was this: The name of a person marked for murder is just a name, but the face makes real the cost of violence, for if we have the nerve to look, we can see in any face our own vulnerability.”

“Give the narrative a lighter tone than you think it deserves, dear boy, lighter than you can bear to give it because you won't find the truth of life in morbidity, only in hope”

“These days, people spent too much time striving to understand their feelings - and then ended up with none that were genuine.”

“He, too, had been glassed-in for a long time, by choice. Now and then he had lifted a hammer to shatter through to something, but he had never struck the blow because he didn't know what he wanted on the other side of the glass.”

“There are people who want everybody dead. When you get over being surprised about that, you have a high amazement threshold.”

“The killer walked with a light step that could be achieved only by someone not weighed down with a conscience, and went out into the night's embrace.”

“La oscuridad devora la brillante luz del día.La oscuridad exige y siempre gana.La oscuridad escucha, observa, espera.La oscuridad reclama el día que celebra.A veces en el silencio llega la oscuridad.A veces con un alegre repique de campanas.”

“Podemos caer en el amor: nunca es demasiado tarde.¿Y por qué, entonces, dormimos odiando?Las creencias no requieren puntos suspensivos para ver que el Infierno es invención nuestra. Hacemos que el Infierno sea de verdad: alimentamos sus fuegos.Y en sus llamas mueren nuestra esperanzas.El Cielo, también, es simplemente una creación nuestra. Podemos otorgarnos nuestra propia salvación.Todo lo que se requiere es imaginación.”

“The more you expect from life, the more your expectations will be fulfilled. By laughing, you do not use up your laughter, but increase your store of it. The more you love, the more you will be loved. The more you give, the more you will receive. Life proves that truth every hour, every day. And life continues to surprise.”

“What will happen will happen. There is time for miracles until there is no more time, but time has no end.”

“I really believe that everyone has a talent, ability, or skill that he can mine to support himself and to succeed in life.”

“...if one's friends do not openly laugh at him, they are not in fact his friends. How else would one learn to avoid saying those things that would elicit laughter from strangers? The mockery of friends is affectionate, and inoculates against foolishness.”

“Most people tend to think the best of those who are blessed with beauty; we have difficulty imagining that physical perfection can conceal twisted emotions or a damaged mind.”

“You be careful, Wizard. Interestingly eccentric friends aren't easy to find.”

“Evil was coming. I wondered whose face it would be wearing.”

“Of course, in the process, you must never do harm to others in any serious way, or you'll cease to amuse Him. Then payment comes due for promises you didn't keep.”

“You can con God and get away with it, Granny said, if you do so with charm and wit. If you live your life with imagination and verve, God will play along just to see what outrageously entertaining thing you'll do next.”

“Too much mystery is merely an annoyance. Too much adventure is exhausting. And a little terror goes a long way.”

“Once you have had a wonderful dog, a life without one, is a life diminished.”

“Each smallest act of kindness, reverberates across great distances and spans of time --affecting lives unknown to the one who’s generous spirit, was the source of this good echo. Because kindness is passed on and grows each time it’s passed until a simple courtesy becomes an act of selfless courage, years later, and far away. Likewise, each small meanness, each expression of hatred, each act of evil.”

“One of the greatest gifts we receive from dogs is the tenderness they evoke in us. The disappointments of life, the injustices, the battering events that are beyond our control, and the betrayals we endure, from those we befriended and loved, can make us cynical and turn our hearts into flint – on which only the matches of anger and bitterness can be struck into flame. By their delight in being with us, the reliable sunniness of their disposition, the joy they bring to playtime, the curiosity with which they embrace each new experience, dogs can melt cynicism,and sweeten the bitter heart.”

“We are fictioneers.”

“Truth is always stranger than fiction. We craft fiction to match our sense of how things ought to be, but truth cannot be crafted. Truth is, and truth has a way of astonishing us to our knees. Reminding us, that the universe does not exist to fulfill our expectations. Because we are imperfect beings who are self-blinded to the truth of the world’s stunning complexity, we shave reality to paper thin theories and ideologies that we can easily grasp – and we call them truths. But the truth of a sea in all it’s immensity cannot be embodied in one tidewashed pebble.”

“Some lives, conducted with grace, are beautiful arcs bridging this world to eternity.”

“Time doesn’t, as advertised, heal all wounds. Although the wrenching immediacy of grief eventually passed, the settled sorrow that replaced it might in its own way be even more intense.”

“... we are in this boot camp to learn, that if we don't persevere through all this world's obstacles and all its wounds, we won't earn our next life of great adventure.”

“We may lack riches, but the greatest fortune is what lies in our hearts.”

“Be happy. Persevere.”

“I curse the night I let your idiot father squirt you into me.”

“Being polite is not only the right way to respond to people but also the easiest.”

“Puppies are adorable. I'm not a puppy.”

“I love you more than life.”

“The depth of your wardrobe dazzles the mind. Ralph Lauren weeps.”

“Best thing that can happen to a man is a good woman.”