Dean Koontz Quotes

Biography

Type: Novelist, Short story writer, Screenwriter, Poet

Born: Dean Ray Koontz,July 9, 1945,Everett, Penn

Died:

When he was a senior in college, Dean Koontz won an Atlantic Monthly fiction competition and has been writing ever since. His books are published in 38 languages and he has sold over 450 million copies to date.

Dean Koontz Quotes

Hope lies in action. Dean Koontz
Hope lies in action

A broken thing can't fix itself.. Dean Koontz
A broken thing can't fix itself.

In this world only the paranoid survive.. Dean Koontz
In this world only the paranoid survive.

Are you one of those people who uses words more for the sound than for the
Are you one of those people who uses words more for the sound than for the sense of them?

She was fascinated with words. To her, words were things of beauty, each like a magical
She was fascinated with words. To her, words were things of beauty, each like a magical powder or potion that could be combined with other words to create powerful spells.

I've been badly scared myself, badly, for quite a few years now. You learn to live
I've been badly scared myself, badly, for quite a few years now. You learn to live with it.

Knowing the names of things is a way to pay respect to the beauty of the
Knowing the names of things is a way to pay respect to the beauty of the world...

It's so damn hard to bloom... to change. Even when you want to change, want it
It's so damn hard to bloom... to change. Even when you want to change, want it more than anything in the world, it's hard. Desire to change isn't enough. Or desperation. Couldn't be done without...love,

Words are the wellspring of the world, and language is the most powerful weapon in the
Words are the wellspring of the world, and language is the most powerful weapon in the ancient and still unfolding war between truth and lies.

All but universally, human architecture values front elevations over back entrances, public spaces over private. Danny
All but universally, human architecture values front elevations over back entrances, public spaces over private. Danny Jessup says that this aspect of architecture is also a reflection of human nature, that most people care more about their appearance than they do about their souls.

...it will be a world made not bright but brighter, not clean but cleaner.. Dean Koontz
...it will be a world made not bright but brighter, not clean but cleaner.

I need useful work to keep my mind occupied, but I'd like to find work where
I need useful work to keep my mind occupied, but I'd like to find work where it's...quieter.

By doing, I learn what to do. By going, I learn where to go. One day,
By doing, I learn what to do. By going, I learn where to go. One day, by dying, I'll learn how to die, and leave the world and hope to land in light.

It's immeasurably easier to live in a world that's all surfaces, that means nothing and demands
It's immeasurably easier to live in a world that's all surfaces, that means nothing and demands nothing of you.

It's a world of sorrow, Oddie, because we make it so.. Dean Koontz
It's a world of sorrow, Oddie, because we make it so.

Living in a monastery, even as a guest rather than a monk, you have more opportunities
Living in a monastery, even as a guest rather than a monk, you have more opportunities than you might have elsewhere to see the world as it is, instead of through the shadow that you cast upon it.

When we make our own misery we sometimes cling to it even when we want so
When we make our own misery we sometimes cling to it even when we want so bad to change, because misery is something we know. The misery is comfortable.

Change isn't easy. Changing the way you live means changing the way you think, means changing
Change isn't easy. Changing the way you live means changing the way you think, means changing what you believe about life. That's hard.

The truth was stranger than the official fiction.. Dean Koontz
The truth was stranger than the official fiction.

In this age, lies were the universal lubricant of the culture. A love of Truth and
In this age, lies were the universal lubricant of the culture. A love of Truth and commitment to it were seldom rewarded and were often punished.

What doesn't quicken dies. That's an indisputable truth of life.

You won't find the truth of life in morbidity, only in hope.

Fate isn’t one straight road…there are forks in it, many different routes to different ends. We have the free will to choose the path.

No one can grant you happiness. Happiness is a choice we all have the power to make.

For the likes of you, the path to happiness is one mean son of a bitch of a path.

But the universe in its immensity is nevertheless of a piece, and what applies at one end of it applies at the other. No doubt misery, like happiness and hope, is found throughout the stars.

She said...she said don't be scared, we wasn't born to be all the time scared, we was born happy, babies laugh at everything, we was born happy and to make a better world.

When you have dogs, you witness their uncomplaining acceptance of suffering, their bright desire to make the most of life in spite of the limitations of age and disease, their calm awareness of the approaching end when their final hours come. They accept death with a grace that I hope I will one day be brave enough to muster.

A man begins dying at the moment of his birth. Most People live in denial of Death's patient courtship until, late in life and deep in sickness, they become aware of him sitting bedside.

The dead are merely the countrymen of my future.

That is, Jack thought, the way of life. The horror changes us, because we can never forget. Cursed with memory. It starts when we're old enough to know what death is and realize that sooner or later we'll lose everyone we love. We're never the same. But somehow we're all right. We go on.

Being alone can be good. It's easy to find peace alone. But sometimes, being alone is a king of death.

How obvious can it be? ... The purpose of makeup is to defy the degradations of time, and time is just a synonym for death.

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.

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.

We can approach belief from an intellectual path, but in the end, God must be taken on faith. Proofs are for things of this world, things in time and of time, not beyond time.

Even when God is your co-pilot, it pays to pack a parachute.

Home was not a perfect place. But it was the only home they had and they could hope to make it better.

Imagine that you are more than nothing. Evil made you, but you are no more evil than a child unborn. If you want, if you seek, if you hope, who is to say that your hope might not be answered?

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

For a long time things were so bad. Very bad. Dark even when there was light.
The only thing that kept the dark back was the Forever Shiny Thing that was her secret...
It is a word...the word hangs on a silver chain. The word is HOPE.

Hope wasn't a cottage industry; it was neither a product that she could manufacture like needlepoint samplers nor a substance she could secrete, in her cautious solitude, like a maple tree producing the essence of syrup. Hope was to be found in other people, by reaching out, by taking risks, by opening her fortress heart.

...hope and trust will more reliably keep a man afloat, while fear is more like to sink him.

Hope, love, and faith are in the waiting

Hope, love and faith are in the waiting.

I never plan for the future but wander into it with a smile on my face, hope in my heart, and the hair up on the nape of my neck.

Give the narrative a lighter tone than you think it deserves, dear boy, lighter than you think you can bear to give it," he instructed before I began to write, "because you won't find the truth of life in morbidity, only in hope.

On a small table beside his chair were other haphazardly stacked volumes by such poets as Emerson, Whitman, and Wallace Stevens, a dangerous crew to let into your head.

...the more we learn, the more we realize how much we don't know.

the divine has taken a few steps back from humankind, perhaps in revulsion, perhaps because we don't deserve to look directly upon holy beings anymore.... When the divine enters the world these days from outside of time, it manifests discreetly through children and animals.

The secret is not to think, we think in words. And what lies beyond the reality we see is a truth that words can't contain, the secret is to feel.

She has suffered so much, and that sorrows me. But she has been strong in the face of unthinkable adversity, and that inspires me.

Quantum theory tells us, Mr. Thomas, that every point in the universe is intimately connected to every other point, regardless of apparent distance. In some mysterious way, any point on a planet in a distant galaxy is as close to me as you are.

Mr. Thomas, any scientist will tell you that in nature many systems appear to be chaotic, but when you study them long enough and closely enough, strange order always underlies the appearance of chaos.

Most people regarded Psychology as a science. Some called it a soft science, but those making such a distinction grew fewer by the year.

To many people, free will is a license to rebel not against what is unjust or hard in life but against what is best for them and true.

The geometry of judgment is a circle. Hate is a snake that turns to consume itself from the tail, a circle that diminishes to a point, then to nothing. Pride is such a snake, and envy, and greed. Love, however, is a hoop, a wheel, that rolls on forever. We are rescued by those whom we have rescued. The saved become the saviors of their saviors.

My only armor is my belief that life has meaning...

Funny how people that don't believe in nothin' are so quick to believe every crazy story about people like us.

In a book, even the real bastards can't hurt you. And you can never loose a friend you make in a book. When you get to a sad part, no one's there to see you cry. Or wonder why you don't cry when you should.

Although he never speaks of how or what or why, I know that his childhood was difficult, that his parents broke his heart. Books and excess poundage are his insulation against pain.

The clump-and-thud of avalanching books suggested that someone must be using the weapon of knowledge in an unconventional fashion.

Waiting is one of the things that human beings cannot do well, though it is one of the essential things we must do successfully if we are to know happiness. We are impatient for the future and try to craft it with our own powers, but hte future will come as it ocmes and will not be hurried.

He once told me that an August evening was "as hot as three toads in a Cuisinart," a comparison that left me blinking two days later.

He's got a chloroform-soaked rag in one hand, and before Judy realizes what's happening, the dude is all over her like fat on cheese.

Sometimes waiting is the hardest thing.

In my bones, I know that I am not long for this world.

Money and beauty are defenses against the sorrows of this world but neither can undo the past. Only time will conquer time. The way forward is the only way back to innocence and to peace.

Once, there were no predators, no prey. Only harmony. There were no quakes, no storms, everything in balance. In the beginning, time was all at once and forever - no past, present, and future, no death. We broke it all.

Nothing before its time, son. Everything in its own time, to its own schedule.

Then what are you? An electronic Hannibal Lector? You can't eat my liver with fava beans through a modem, you know.

I am the One, and I see all.
But the blind man in Apartment 1-A is blind in many ways, as are all human beings, even those with functioning eyes. They are blind to their folly, to their ignorance, to their history, to the future that they will make for themselves. A future born of self-loathing.

What we fear too much we often bring to pass.

My unique path through life has led me, however, to fear known threats but seldom the unknown, while most people fear both.

Terror and pleasure are linked in us. We are a baldly miswired species, Martie. Terror delights us, both the experience of terror and the dealing out of it to others. We are healthier if we admit to this miswiring and do not struggle to be better than our natures allow.

Winny didn't know what he would do without his books, except probably go berserk and start killing people and making ashtrays out of their skulls even though he didn't smoke and never would.

Maybe if everything was beautiful, nothing would be.
People saw one thing, they swooned over it. They saw this other thing, they pounded it with sticks.
Maybe there had to be variety for life to work. Swoon over everything, you get bored. Beat everything with a stick-boring.

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.

Ah, sir, that's just mean. She's not a Victoria's Secret model, but she's pretty in her way.

Do not doubt the beauty of your heart.

Every beautiful facade seemed to conceal rot and ruin that I could almost see.

Her exceptional beauty also helps her to keep her secrets. 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.

Beauty that steals the heart is often imperfect, suggests grace and kindness, and inspires tenderness more than it incites lust.

She turned more heads than a coven of chiropractors.

In his mind he saw them standing with the tips of their organs pressed together ejaculating into each other's penis.

A high degree of intelligence yes in no other creature in the natural world. That's why nature shuns us and why we subconsciously hate her and seek to obliterate her. High intelligence leads to the concept of progress. Progress leads to nuclear weapons, bio-engineering chaos and ultimately to annihilation.

Whatever happens here, trust your heart. It's as true as any compass.

His resiliency was not the resiliency of the dumb but of a lamb who can remember hurt but cannot sustain the anger or the bitterness that brittles the heart.

In even a clear heart, some righteous acts of the harder kind can stir up a sediment of guilt, but that is not a bad thing. If allowed to be, the heart is self-policing, and a reasonable measure of guilt guards against corruption.

Sometimes it seems that to exit this world, they must go through my heart, leaving me scarred and sore.

She never had much in this life, but with the simplest things, she made her corner of the world as beautiful as any king's palace. We may lack riches, but the greatest fortune is what lies in our hearts.

This isn't a reasoned response to a configuration of stars, but the heart cannot flourish on logic alone. Unreason is an essential medicine as long as you don't overdose

Although her eyes are neither golden nor heavenly blue, Terri Stambaugh has the vision of an angel, for she sees through you and knows your truest heart, but loves you anyway, in spite of all the ways that you have fallen from a state of grace.

We make so many of our own troubles, from mere mishaps to disasters, by dwelling on the possibility of them until the possible becomes inevitable.

Where does fiction end and reality begin?

Human beings not only can't bear too much reality, we flee from reality when someone doesn't force us close enough to the fire to feel the heat on our faces.

With lead he shaded love into the woman's eyes.

Sometimes, just trying was a triumph.

A man and a woman cannot live together without having against each other a kind of everlasting joke. Each has discovered that the other is not only a fool, but a great fool.

What really holds their marriage together are mutual respect of an awesome depth, a shared sense of humor, faith that they were brought together by a force greater than themselves, and a love so unwavering and pure that it is sacred.

She says what holds their marriage together is that she feels too damn sorry for him to ask for a divorce.

Pain can be endured and defeated only if it is embraced. Denied or feared, it grows in perception if not in reality. The best response to terror is righteous anger, confidence in ultimate justice, a refusal to be intimidated.

He would pray...for everyone who knew pain, which meant everyone who wore a human face.

Her stare was direct and unwavering, full of confidence earned from painful experience...

I was the worst kind of fool. When I look back on that August night, changed forever by all my wounds and all my suffering, that undamaged Odd Thomas seems like a different human being from me, immeasurably more confident than I am now, still able to hope, but not as wise, and I mourn for him.

Sleep is a kind of peace, and I have not yet earned peace.

If you're still, and if you don't hope too much, peace will come to you. It's a grace. But you have to choose happiness.

Evil itself may be relentless. I will grant you that, but love is relentless too. Friendship is a relentless force. Family is a relentless force. Faith is relentless force. The human spirit is relentless, and the human heart outlasts - and can defeat - even the most relentless force of all, which is time.

...he was part of a family whether he wanted to be or not, the family of humanity, more often than not a frustrating and contentious clan, flawed and often deeply confused, but also periodically noble and admirable, with a common destiny that every member shared.

But the more people we love and the more deeply we love them, the more vulnerable we are to loss and grief and loneliness.

...what makes humanity beautiful is our free will, our individuality, our endless striving in spite of our imperfection.

BY THE LIGHT OF THE MOON
Chapter 27 Page 214

People scare me more than anything, for I know too well the savagery of which humankind is capable.

From all these friends, I could not escape learning some of the statistics that I preferred not to know. Forty-one people at the mall had been wounded. Nineteen had died.
Everyone said it was a miracle that only nineteen perished.
What has gone wrong with our world when nineteen dead can seem like any kind of miracle?

Then perhaps you shouldn't sleep. The imagination has terrifying power.

Eventually he understood that he was crying for himself. He was ashamed of the man whom he had become, mourning the man whom he had expected to be when he'd been a boy.

That stormy day in the desert, however, much changed for me. We must have our goals, our dreams and we must strive for them. We are not gods, however; we do not have the power to shape every aspect of the future. And the road the world makes for us is one that teaches humility if we are willing to learn.

If you're going to keep the music in you, Jonah, you've got to play a little bit every day purely for pleasure. Otherwise, you'll lose the joy of it, and if you lose the joy, you won't sound good to those who know piano - or to yourself.

It is music that speaks to the deepest reaches of your soul, and you are lifted higher, ever higher, by the adagio, in my opinion more so even than in any of the masses that Beethoven composed.

What has been is no more. Change has come.

Were you always such a snake," the child asked, "or did you grow into what you are?

I don't desire a change of scenery or exotic experiences. My heart yearns for familiarity, stability, the comfort of home- and my sanity depends on it.

people have a natural tendency to anthropomorphize their pets, to ascribe human perceptions and intentions to the animal where none exist

Never leave a friend behind. Friends are all we have to get us through this life-and they are the only things from this world that we could hope to see in the next.

Some people think only intellect counts: knowing how to solve problems, knowing how to get by, knowing how to identify an advantage and seize it. But the functions of intellect are insufficient without courage, love, friendship, compassion, and empathy.

A sixth sense is a miraculous thing, which in itself suggests a supernatural order. The human intellect, however, for all its power and triumphs, is largely formed by this world and is therefore corruptible.

And because we have been given thought, will, and imagination, albeit on a human scale, we too have this power to create.

He lives vividly in her recollections, however, and his memory is etched on her soul.

Life had been hard on this girl, Jacob, but she had enough courage for an army.

Being a bad guy was easy, being a hero was hard.

Considering that the modern and contemporary literature taught in most universities is largely bleak, cynical, morbid, pessimistic, misanthropic dogmatism, often written by suicidal types who sooner or later kill themselves with alcohol or drugs, or shotguns, Professor Takuda was a remarkably cheerful man.

We are all the walking wounded in a world that is a war zone. Everything we love will be taken from us, everything, last of all life itself. Yet everywhere I look, I find great beauty in this battlefield, and grace and the promise of joy.

He's a man," Themla said.
"I guess that explains it."
"Hairy, Neanderthalic," Thelma said, "perpetually half-crazed from excessive levels of testosterone, plagued by racial memories of the lost glory of mammoth-hunting expeditions - they're all alike.

Recognizing the structure of your psychology doesn't mean that you can easily rebuild it.

Always, the eye sees more than the mind can comprehend, and we go through life self-blinded to much that lies before us. We want a simple world, but we live in a magnificently complex one, and rather than open ourselves to it, we perceive the world through filters that make it less daunting.

Each book is a mind alive, a life revealed, a world awaiting exploration, but living people are all those things, as well - and more, because their stories haven’t yet been completely told.

In tragedy and despair, when an endless night seems to have fallen, hope can be found in the realization taht the companion of night is not another night, that the companion of night is day, that darkness always gives way to light, and that death rules only half of creation, life the other half.

If there's nothing to learn because we know it all, what's the challenge? Why would the effort matter? What would be the point? - Odd Thomas

So many things in my continuing education are learned by going where I have to go and doing what I have to do. Therefore, my only answer is: "I guess I'll find out.

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