“There are no explanations for human evil. Only excuses.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Hunches [are] just messages from the subconscious, which [is] thinking furiously all the time and processing information we have not consciously noted.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“But victimhood was seductive, a release from responsibility and caring. Fear would be transmuted into weary resignation; failure would no longer generate guilt but, instead, would spawn a comforting self-pity.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Human cruelty and treachery surpassed all understanding. There were no answers. Only excuses.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Even if God exists, does He know that you do?”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Much of her life had been lived like a balancing act on a spearpoint fence, and on a particularly difficult night when she was twelve, she had decided that instinct was, in fact, the quiet voice of God. Prayers did receive replies, but you had to listen closely and believe in the answer. At twelve, she wrote in her diary: "God doesn't shout; He whispers, and in the whisper is the way.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Not all or even most suffering is at the hands of fate; it befalls us at our invitation.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“She'd been acutely aware that terror, betrayal, and cruelty had a human face, but she had not sufficiently appreciated that courage, kindness, and love had a human face as well.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Sometimes, just trying was a triumph.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“God does not shout; He whispers, and in that whisper is the way." Chyna Shepard in "Intensity”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Power is living while others inevitably perish. Power is cool indifference to their suffering. Power is taking nourishment from the deaths of others, just as the mighty redwoods draw sustenance from the perpetual decomposition of what once lived, but lived only briefly, around them. This is also part of the philosophy of Edgler Foreman Vess.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“The sole purpose of existence is to open oneself to sensation and to satisfy all appetites as they arise.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“she’d known that being a victim was often a choice people made.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Chyna Shepherd, untouched and alive and able to pee.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“She was reduced to the dependency of an infant, too terrified of life itself to find solace anywhere but in the familiar succoring breast and in the sound of that same heartbeat remembered from the womb.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Now he must deal with the security system, which has recorded everything that he's done. A video camera is mounted over the front door and focused on the cashiers' counter. Edgler Foreman Vess has no desire to see himself on television news. Living with intensity is virtually impossible when one is in prison.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“She wasn’t clay in the hands of others; she was rock, and with her own determined hands, she could sculpt the person that she wanted to be.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“The normality of the house terrified her: the gleaming surfaces, the tidiness, the homey touches, the sense that a person lived here who might walk in daylight on any street and pass for human in spite of the atrocities that he had committed.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“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.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“It is the purpose for which we exist. This reckless caring.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“victimhood was seductive, a release from responsibility and caring: Fear would be transmuted into weary resignation; failure would no longer generate guilt but, instead, would spawn a comforting self-pity.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“She’d been living in a prison since the day she’d been born, even after leaving her mother, a prison of fear and shame and lowered expectations, and she’d been so accustomed to her circumscribed life that she had not recognized the bars.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“The value of any experience isn’t in its positive or negative effect on his life but in the sheer luminous power of it, the vividness, the ferocity, the amount and degree of pure sensation that it provides. Intensity.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“If coincidence can give, it can take.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“She wasn’t clay in the hands of others; she was rock, and with her own determined hands, she could sculpt the person that she wanted to be. She”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Echoing off the tile walls, the sizzle-splash of the falling water sounded like the hissing of serpents and the brittle laughter of strange children.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“A truly nice smile combined with self-control can take a person a long way.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“On the first of July, while Ariel sat on their blanket, gazing out at the sun-spangled water, Chyna tried to read a newspaper, but every story distressed her. War, rape, murder, robbery, politicians spewing hatred from all ends of the political spectrum. She read a movie review full of vicious ipse dixit criticism of the director and screenwriter, questioning their very right to create, and then turned to a woman columnist’s equally vitriolic attack on a novelist, none of it genuine criticism, merely venom, and she threw the paper in a trash can.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
“Asshole.” “Your mother never taught you words like that.” “You don’t know my mother,” she said thickly.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Intensity
Dean Koontz
Born place: in Everett, Pennsylvania, The United States
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“Holding my face with his hands, fingers buried deep in my hair, he stares down at me in the darkness.
“It’s always been you, Tru. Always.”
― Samantha Towle, quote from The Mighty Storm
“People who claim to know jackrabbits will tell you they are primarily motivated by Fear, Stupidity, and Craziness. But I have spent enough time in jack rabbit country to know that most of them lead pretty dull lives; they are bored with their daily routines: eat, fuck, sleep, hop around a bush now and then....No wonder some of them drift over the line into cheap thrills once in a while; there has to be a powerful adrenalin rush in crouching by the side of a road, waiting for the next set of headlights to come along, then streaking out of the bushes with split-second timing and making it across to the other side just inches in front of the speeding front wheels”
― Hunter S. Thompson, quote from Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72
“Csónakosi taskus leidus kõike. Pole sellist turgugi, kus oleks nii palju kõige mitmekesisemaid asju kui Csónakosi taskus. Seal oli sulenuga, nööri, kuule, vasest ukselink, naelu, võti, riiet, märkmik, punnivinn ja jumal ise teab, mis veel.”
― Ferenc Molnár, quote from The Paul Street Boys
“Это свинство, и это... жизнь. Какой же смысл в бессмертии свинства? К чему все
это ведет? Зачем все это нужно? Вы не создаете пищи, а между тем пища,
съеденная или выброшенная вами, могла бы спасти жизнь десяткам несчастных,
которые эту пищу создают, но не едят. Какого бессмертия заслужили вы? Или
они? Возьмите нас с вами. Чего стоит ваше хваленое бессмертие, когда ваша
жизнь столкнулась с моей? Вам хочется назад, на сушу, так как там раздолье
для привычного вам свинства. По своему капризу я держу вас на этой шхуне,
где процветает мое свинство. И буду держать. Я или сломаю вас, или
переделаю. Вы можете умереть здесь сегодня, через неделю, через месяц. Я мог
бы одним ударом кулака убить вас, -- ведь вы жалкий червяк. Но если мы
бессмертны, то какой во всем этом смысл? Вести себя всю жизнь по-свински,
как мы с вами, -- неужели это к лицу бессмертным? Так для чего же это все?
Почему я держу вас тут?
-- Потому, что вы сильнее, -- выпалил я.
-- Но почему я сильнее? -- не унимался он. -- Потому что во мне больше
этой закваски, чем в вас. Неужели вы не понимаете? Неужели не понимаете?
-- Но жить так -- это же безнадежность! -- воскликнул я.
-- Согласен с вами, -- ответил он. -- И зачем оно нужно вообще, это
брожение, которое и есть сущность жизни? Не двигаться, не быть частицей
жизненной закваски, -- тогда не будет и безнадежности. Но в этомто все и
дело: мы хотим жить и двигаться, несмотря на всю бессмысленность этого,
хотим, потому что это заложено в нас природой, -- стремление жить и
двигаться, бродить. Без этого жизнь остановилась бы. Вот эта жизнь внутри
вас и заставляет вас мечтать о бессмертии. Жизнь внутри вас стремится быть
вечно. Эх! Вечность свинства!”
― Jack London, quote from The Sea Wolf
“I wonder how her tribe can make such strange and complicated clothing but not even know how to wear a simple wrap!”
― Shay Savage, quote from Transcendence
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Anne's House of Drea...BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.
