Dean Koontz Quotes

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

The heart is an artist that paints over what profoundly disturbs it, leaving on the canvas a less dark, less sharp version of the truth.

I never have lunch because it makes me foggy-headed.

A scar is not always a flaw. Sometimes a scar may be redemption inscribed in the flesh, a memorial to something endured, to something lost.

I think it's perfectly just to refuse service to anyone based on behavior, but not based on race or religion.

I try not to spend too much time on partisan politics. Life's too short for that. I don't really believe that there have been many human problems solved by politics.

The dead are merely the countrymen of my future.

Being paid well for something you love to do - it's a grace.

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.

I don't procrastinate because I love the English language and the process of storytelling, and I'm always curious to see what will come to me next. If you procrastinate a lot, you might be one who loves having written, but doesn't so much like writing.

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.

I have learned a great deal from novels. Some of it is even true.

In misfortune lies the seed of future triumph.

I see dead people. But, then by God, I do something about it!

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.

Dogs are one of those things that make you happy and make you wonder.

If you write with passion in your own style, you will make a place for yourself

Creating a family in this turbulent world is an act of faith, a wager that against all odds there will be a future, that love can last, that the heart can triumph against all adversities and even against the grinding wheel of time.

Any drunk who has tried to put his car where a lamppost stands is a self-educated physicist.

One of the greatest gifts we receive from dogs is the tenderness they evoke in us

Books are packaged dreams.

She might have been born this way, without an empathy gene and other essentials. In that case, she would interpret any kindness as weakness. Among predatory beasts, any display of weakness is an invitation to attack.

A great deal of phenomenal experience has fostered in me a flexibility of the mind and imagination that some might call madness

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.

Stay low, stay quiet, keep it simple, don't expect too much, enjoy what you have.

Grief is a healthy emotion, and it's healthy to embrace it. By accepting loss, we clarify our values and the meaning of our lives.

They said there was no rest for the wicked. In fact, there was rest neither for the virtuous nor the wicked, nor for guys like Billy, who were uncommitted regarding the whole idea of virtue versus wickedness and who were just trying to do their jobs.

Lots of people are unable to see all kinds of truths right in front of their eyes." "The world is what we make it, and our future is ours to shape.

I imagined a life that turned out to be pretty much exactly like the one I've had. That fascinates me endlessly. I wake up many mornings, and it almost wouldn't surprise me if I woke up from it and it was all a dream.

The world needed a little Evil, so Good had something to compare itself to, but you couldn't let it think it had the right-of-way on the road and an invitation to dinner.

Tommy told Sal about the strange white-cloth figure with black stitches that he had found on the front porch. "Sounds like Pillsbury Doughboy gone punk," Sal said.

Out of sight above the house, the mirror moon reflected the sun of a day not yet dawned, shining the pale light of tomorrow on the yard and on the paper birches.

What sucks the worst is . . . this world was a gift to us, and we broke it, and part of the deal is that if we want things right, we have to fix it ourselves. But we can't. We try, but we can't.

Every eye sees its own special vision; every ear hears a most different song. In each man's troubled heart, an incision would reveal a unique, shameful wrong.

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 only thing I know for sure is how much I do not know.

The hard rain nailed the night to the city.

Appearances are not reality; but they often can be a convincing alternative to it. You can control appearances most of the time, but facts are what they are. When the facts are too sharp, you can craft a cheerful version of the situation and cover the facts the way that you can covered a battered old four-slice toaster with a knitted cozy featuring images of kittens.

I am no theologian. I would not be surprised, however, if Heaven proved to be a cozy kitchen, where delicious treats appeared in the oven and in the refrigerator whenever you wanted them, and where the cupboards were full of good books.

Loss is the hardest thing, I said. But it's also the teacher that's the most difficult to ignore.

I believe in the possibility of miracles but, more to the point, I believe in our need for them.

I enjoy the hell out of writing but don't like what follows: promotion and publicity, which I always strive to keep to a minimum, sometimes to my publisher's dismay.

I've always operated with a great deal of self-doubt. Every time I start a new book it's like, well, this one will destroy the career and I have to overcome that feeling especially in the first hundred pages of the book.

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.

That's all that matters, really: that we can make each other feel better.

Behind every closed door might wait a thief of minds and a collector of souls.

The desire to write well can never be fulfilled without hard work.

Where there is cake, there is hope. And there is always cake.