Dean Koontz: Use

“None of us can ever save himself; we are the instruments of one another’s salvation, and only by the hope that we give to others do we lift ourselves out of the darkness into light.”

Dean Koontz book One Door Away from Heaven

Source: One Door Away from Heaven (2001), chapter 73, pp. 604, 605
Context: What will you find behind the door that is one door away from Heaven? […] If your heart is closed, then you will find behind that door nothing to light your way. But if your heart is open, you will find behind that door people who, like you, are searching, and you will find the right door together with them. None of us can ever save himself; we are the instruments of one another's salvation, and only by the hope that we give to others do we lift ourselves out of the darkness into light.

Hope , Light

“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.”

Dean Koontz book Fear Nothing

Source: Fear Nothing

Friendship , For Friend , For Bestfriend , Life

“If we were always conscious of the fact that people precious to us are frighteningly mortal, hanging not even by a thread, but by a wisp of gossamer, perhaps we would be kinder to them and more grateful for the love and friendship they give to us.”

Dean Koontz book Seize the Night

Source: Seize the Night

Love , Friendship , People

“We have a responsibility to stand watch over one another, we are watchers, all of us, watchers, guarding against the darkness.”

Dean Koontz book Watchers

Part 2, Chapter 9.2; Nora to an ill and unresponsive Einstein at the veterinary clinic
Watchers (1987)
Context: I thought of you as my guardian, Einstein… you taught me that I'm your guardian, too, that I'm Travis's guardian, and he is my guardian and yours. We have a responsibility to stand watch over one another, we are watchers, all of us, watchers, guarding against the darkness. You've taught me that we're all needed, even those who sometimes think we're worthless, plain, and dull.

“The things we worry about the most are never the things that bite us. The sharpest teeth always take their nip of us when we are looking the other way.”

Dean Koontz book Forever Odd

Source: Forever Odd

Way

“Darkness dwells within even the best of us. In the worst of us, darkness not only dwells but reins.”

Dean Koontz book Strange Highways

Source: Strange Highways

“Reality isn't what it used to be.”

Dean Koontz book The Taking

Source: The Taking

Reality

“Maybe there's nothing impossible tonight. We're down the hole to Wonderland, and no White Rabbit to guide us."
If I remember correctly, the White Rabbit was an unreliable guide, anyway.”

Dean Koontz book The Taking

Source: The Taking

“Evil is no faceless stranger, living in a distant neighborhood. Evil has a wholesome, hometown face, with merry eyes and an open smile. Evil walks among us, wearing a mask which looks like all our faces.”

Dean Koontz

Smile , Distant , Evil

“Bad people succeed and good people fail, but that's not the end of the story. Miracles happen that nobody sees, and among us walk heroes who are never recognized, and people live in loneliness because they cannot believe they are loved.”

Dean Koontz book The Darkest Evening of the Year

Source: The Darkest Evening of the Year

Love , People , Loneliness

“The opportunity to love a dog and to treat it with kindness is an opportunity for a lost and selfish heart to be redeemed. They are powerless and innocent, and it is how we treat the humblest among us that surely determines the fate of our souls”

Dean Koontz book The Darkest Evening of the Year

Source: The Darkest Evening of the Year

Love , Fate , Dogs , Soul

“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.”

Dean Koontz book Forever Odd

Source: Forever Odd

World , Parting

“The primitive in each of us climbs closer to the surface during the night, for the moon sings to it, and the cold void between the stars speaks its language. To that savage self, evil can look lovely in too little light.”

Dean Koontz book False Memory

Source: False Memory

Love , Star , Light , Evil

“Dylan… said, "Both Becky and Kenny need medical attention—"
"And a prison cell until their social security kicks in," Jilly added.
"—but give us two or three minutes before you call 9-1-1," Dylan finished.
This instruction baffled Marj. "But you are 9-1-1."
Jilly fielded that peculiar question: "We're one of the ones, Marj, but we're not the other one or the nine."”

Dean Koontz book By the Light of the Moon

after Dylan & Jilly (who had claimed to be an undercover policewoman) save Marj and her grandson from homicidal teenagers
By the Light of the Moon (2002)

Question

“Pain is a gift. Humanity, without pain, would know neither fear nor pity. Without fear, there could be no humility, and every man would be a monster. The recognition of pain and fear in others give rise in us to pity, and in our pity is our humanity, our redemption.”

Dean Koontz book Velocity

Source: Velocity (2005), Chapter 54

Pain , Fear

“Blizzards, floods, volcanos, hurricanes, earthquakes: They fascinate because they nakedly reveal that Mother Nature, afflicted with bipolar disorder, is as likely to snuff us as she is to succor us.”

Dean Koontz book The Taking

Part 1, Chapter 1
The Taking (2004)

Nature , Affliction

“For most of her existence, Molly had not shied from a truth that most people understood but diligently suppressed: that every moment of every day, depending on the faith we embrace, each of us continues to live either by the merciful sufferance of God or at the whim of blind chance and indifferent nature.”

Dean Koontz book The Taking

Part 1, Chapter 2
The Taking (2004)

God , People , Truth , Faith

“Experts must read the patterns and judge their usefulness as evidence. Under any of numerous pressures, an expert may wish to misread a pattern or even to alter it. Americans had a touching trust in "experts."”

Dean Koontz book The Good Guy

Krait musing about fingerprints
Source: The Good Guy (2007), Chapter 21, p. 147

Reading

“Maybe Nina wouldn't have died if I hadn't moved in with them and drawn Sheener after me, but I can't feel guilty about that. I tried hard to be a good foster daughter to them, and they were happy with me. What happened was that life dropped a big custard pie on us, and that's not my fault; you can never see the custard pies coming. It's not good slapstick if you see the pie coming."
"Custard pie?" he asked, perplexed. "You see life as a slapstick comedy? Like the Three Stooges?"
"Partly."
"Life is just a joke then?"
"No. Life is serious and a joke at the same time."
"But how can that be?”

Dean Koontz book Lightning

"If you don't know," she said, "maybe I should be the one asking the questions here."
Part I, Chapter 2.10, dialog between 12-year-old Laura Shane and a psychotherapist after the death of her foster mother
Lightning (1988)

Life , Feeling , Question , Time

“Fric had been assigned the dumbest of the standard tones, which the phone manufacturer described as "a cheerful, child-pleasing sound suitable for the nursery or the bedrooms of younger children." Why infants in nurseries or toddlers in cribs ought to have their own telephones remained a mystery to Fric. Were they going to call Babies R Us and order lobster-flavored teething rings?”

Dean Koontz book The Face

Source: The Face (2003), Chapter 13; describing the estate's elaborate phone system

Children , Baby