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And The Funny Thing Was If You Made The Best Of It, If You Smiled Through Every Storm, The Bad Things Were Never As Terrible As You Expected Them To Be, And The Good Things Were Better Than Anything You Could Have Wished For Yourself.

-Dean Koontz

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And The Funny Thing

Dean Koontz

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And The Funny Thing Was If You Made The Best Of It, If You Smiled Through Every Storm, The Bad Things Were Never As Terrible As You Expected Them To Be, And The Good Things Were Better Than Anything You Could Have Wished For Yourself.

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Night Has Patterns That Can Be Read Less By The Living Than By The Dead.

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.

I Think It's Perfectly Just To Refuse Service To Anyone Based On Behavior, But Not Based On Race Or Religion.

Although The Constant Shadow Of Certain Death Looms Over Everyday, The Pleasures And Joys Of Life Can Be So Fine And Affecting That The Heart Is Nearly Stilled In Astonishment.

I Have Been Reading Stephen King Since Carrie And Hope To Read Him For Many Years To Come.

As Individuals, As Families, As Neighbors, As Members Of One Community, People Of All Races And Political Views Are Usually Decent, Kind, Compassionate. But In Large Corporations Or Governments, When Great Power Accumulates In Their Hands, Some Become Monsters Even With Good Intentions.

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I Am Basically A Pretty Good Autodidact. I Can Teach Myself Things.

Each Reader Needs To Bring His Or Her Own Mind And Heart To The Text.

If I Had To Write A Rough Draft, All The Way Through And Then Go Back And Start Over, I Probably Would Just Stop Writing. I Wouldn't Find That Interesting. I Would Feel That I Had Committed So Many Things To The Paper That I Couldn't Easily Undo Because One Thing Leads To The Next, The Interconnectedness, The Sequences Would Make It Very Hard To Change Something That Simply Didn't Work.

...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.

Is Rule Of Thumb In Writing Game: If Story Requires Many Long Descriptions Of Smells So Vile That Will Give Reader Nausea, Is Not Likely To Find Publisher.

In Self-defense And In Defense Of The Innocent, Cowardice Is The Only Sin.

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A Plot Without Action Is Like Pasta Without Garlic, Like Dolly Parton Without Cleavage, And Like A Writer Without His Similes.

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Perseverance Is Impossible If We Don't Permit Ourselves To Hope.

Home Was Not A Perfect Place. But It Was The Only Home They Had And They Could Hope To Make It Better.

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Cowards Shrink From Toil And Peril, Vulgar Souls Attempt And Fail; Men Of Mettle, Nothing Daunted, Persevere Till They Prevail.

Your Sense Of Responsibility To Others Can Never Be Excessive.

Responsibility To Others

Sense Of Responsibility

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...in An Infinite Universe, Anything That Could Be Imagined Might Somewhere Exist.

Infinite Universe

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Few Human Beings Give Of Themselves To Another As A Dog Gives Of Itself.

I Think The World Is Full Of Evil People. I Think In Some Ways We're In More Danger Now Than Before.

The Hard Rain Nailed The Night To The City.

When New Hopes Fail, Old Hopes Return In The Endless Cycle Of Desperation.

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.

Loving The Ideal More Than The Reality Is The Cause Of All The Misery The Human Species Creates For Itself.

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.

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One Door Away From Heaven And The Key Is Ours To Lose. One Door Away From Heaven But Oh, The Entry Dues.

In The End, It's All About Perseverance.

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.

Pain Is All I Know." He Murmured. "peace Is All I Want

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Southerners Have Many Fine Qualities, Charm And Civility Among Them, And A Sense Of The Tragic.

She Says What Holds Their Marriage Together Is That She Feels Too Damn Sorry For Him To Ask For A Divorce.

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.

I Just Became Fascinated With How Complex And Unlikely The Universe Is And Life Is And Catholicism Gives Me An Answer To That.

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.

Love Was A Sacred Garment, Woven Of A Fabric So Thin That It Could Not Be Seen, Yet So Strong That Even Mighty Death Could Not Tear It, A Garment That Could Not Be Frayed By Use, That Brought Warmth Into What Would Otherwise Be An Intolerable, Cold World- But At Times Love Could Also Be As Heavy As Chain Mail. Bearing The Burden Of Love, On Those Occasions When It Was A Solemn Weight, Made It More Precious When, In Better Times, It Caught The Wind In Sleeves Like Wings, And Lifted You.

Ignorance Isn't Bliss, But Sometimes Ignorance Makes It Possible For Us To Sleep At Night.

In This Uncertain Space Between Birth And Death, Especially Here At The End Of The World In Moonlight Bay, We Need Hope As Surely As We Need Food And Water, Love And Friendship. The Trick, However, Is To Remember That Hope Is A Perilous Thing, That It's Not A Steel And Concrete Bridge Across The Void Between This Moment And A Brighter Future. Hope Is No Stronger Than Tremulous Beads Of Dew Strung On A Filament Of Spider Web, And It Alone Can't Long Support The Terrible Weight Of An Anguished Mind And A Tortured Heart.

One Of The Things I Like Enormously About Bob Weinstein Is That That He's The Only Studio Head I Have Ever Known Who Will Change His Mind And Say He Was Wrong.

I Need Those Nukes, The Chief Said. I Need Them, I Need Them Right Now. I Don't Want To Be An Enabler, Sir. I'd Rather Get You Into A Twelve Step Program To Help You Break This Addiction.

A Great Deal Of Phenomenal Experience Has Fostered In Me A Flexibility Of The Mind And Imagination That Some Might Call Madness

Some Days I'm Lucky To Squeeze Out A Page Of Copy That Pleases Me, But I Get As Many As Six Or Seven Pages On A Very Good Day; The Average Is Probably Three Pages.

Every Book Has Some Real Life In It. I Was Never Pursued By An Evil Twin Clone, But Everything Else In Mr. Murder Was Pretty Much Out Of My Own Life.

If Your Work Is Deathwork, One Weapon Is Not Enough, Just As A Plumber Would Not Answer An Urgent Service Call With A Single Wrench.

Your Mind Always Does Worse Things Than People Can Show In A Movie.

Hope Is The Destination That We Seek. Love Is The Road That Leads To Hope. Courage Is The Motor That Drives Us. We Travel Out Of Darkness Into Faith.

Intuition Is Seeing With The Soul.

What Looks Tragic Might Be Comic On Second Consideration, And What Is Comic Might Bring Tears In Time.

Anger Is A Violent Emotion, Vindictive, And As Dangerous To He Who Is Driven By It As To Anyone On Whom It Is Turned.

Six Billion Of Us Walking The Planet, Six Billion Smaller Worlds On The Bigger One. Shoe Salesmen And Short-order Cooks Who Look Boring From The Outside - Some Have Weirder Lives Than You. Six Billion Stories, Every One An Epic, Full Of Tragedy And Triumph, Good And Evil, Despair And Hope. You And Me - We Aren't So Special, Bro.

A Fine Line Separates The Weary Recluse From The Fearful Hermit. Finer Still Is The Line Between Hermit And Bitter Misanthrope.

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Love And Friendship

In The Wind, The Trees, Like Agitated Lions Preparing To Roar, Shook Their Great Green Manes.

She Blinked, Sat Up, And Saw Chris In The Bathroom Doorway. He'd Just Gotten Out The Shower. His Hair Was Damp, And He Was Dressed Only In His Briefs. The Sight Of His Thin, Boyish Body - All Ribs And Elbows And Knees - Pulled At Her Heart, For He Looked So Innocent And Vulnerable. He Was So Small And Fragile That She Wondered How She Could Ever Protect Him, And Renewed Fear Rose In Her.

Writing Isn't A Source Of Pain. It's Psychic Chemotherapy. It Reduces Your Psychological Tumors And Relieves Your Pain.

Not All Or Even Most Suffering Is At The Hands Of Fate; It Befalls Us At Our Invitation.

Fate Cannot Be Sidestepped Or Outrun.

The Most Identifying Trait Of Humanity Is Our Abilty To Be Inhumane To One Another.

I Don't Find Slashing And Blood Flying Everywhere To Be Scary. I Just Find It Repulsive.

The World Howls For Social Justice, But When It Comes To Social Responsibility, You Sometimes Cant Even Hear Crickets Chirping.

The World Is A Very Complex And Interesting Place And That Is What I Really Want My Fiction To Say: Wake Up To How Amazing The World Is.

I See Dead People. But, Then By God, I Do Something About It!

One Man's Idea Of Perfect Order Is Another Man's Chaos.

Writing A Novel Is Like Making Love, But It's Also Like Having A Tooth Pulled. Pleasure And Pain. Sometimes It's Like Making Love While Having A Tooth Pulled.

The Only Thing We Can't Buy More Of Is Time." She Said. "and Dodo Birds. We Can't Buy Any More Of Them. They're Extinct. And Dinosaurs.

Not All Popular Novelists Are Good, But All Good Novelists Are, Sooner Or Later, Popular.

Sooner Or Later

Houses Are Not Haunted. We Are Haunted, And Regardless Of The Architecture With Which We Surround Ourselves, Our Ghosts Stay With Us Until We Ourselves Are Ghosts.

Grapes Are Juicy. Strawberries. Oranges. Good Pork Chops Are Succulent," Said Dusty. "but The Word Isn't Accurately Descriptive Of A Person." Smiling With Delight, Ahriman Said, "oh, Really, Not Accurately Descriptive? Be Careful Housepainter. Your Genes Are Showing. What If I Were A Cannibal?

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.

Loyal Companions Are An Unequaled Grace, Stanching Fear Before It Bleeds You Numb, A Reliable Antidote For Creeping Despair.

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.

Life Without Meaning Cannot Be Borne. We Find A Mission To Which We're Sworn -or Answer The Call Of Death's Dark Horn. Without A Gleaning Of Purpose In Life, We Have No Vision, We Live In Strife, -or Let Blood Fall On A Suicide Knife.

Loneliness Comes In Two Basic Varieties. When It Results From A Desire For Solitude, Loneliness Is A Door We Close Against The World. When The World Instead Rejects Us, Loneliness Is An Open Door, Unused.

My Wife Is My First Audience. She's A Tough Lady, So I Can't Say That I Ever Scare Her. Except, Of Course, When She Sees Me The Way I Look Before Breakfast.

Mankind Has No Right To Employ Its Genius In The Creation Of Another Intelligent Species, Then Treat It Like Property. If We've Come So Far That We Can Create As God Creates, Then We Have To Learn To Act With The Justice And Mercy Of God.

All These Girls Swooning Over Hunky Vampires, What They Really Want Is To Give Away Their Freedom, To Be Controlled And Told What To Do And Not Have To Think -- And Never Die, Of Course. It's Sick Is What It Is. I Don't Want To Be A Forever-young Living Corpse.

A Good Dog Is One Of The Best Things Of All To Be.

Maybe The Devil In Human Beings Isn't The Reflection Of The Devil, Perhaps The Devil Is Only A Reflection Of The Savagery And Brutality Of Our Kind. Maybe What We've Done Is Create The Devil In Our Own Image

Inaction Counted As A Choice.

Language Can't Describe Reality. Literature Has No Stable Reference, No Real Meaning. Each Reader's Interpretation Is Equally Valid, More Important Than The Author's Intention. In Fact, Nothing In Life Has Meaning. Reality Is Subjective. Values And Truths Are Subjective. Life Itself Is A Kind Of Illusion. Blah, Blah, Blah, Let's Have Another Scotch.

Of All The Things We Can Feel With Our Minds And Bodies, Severe Pain Is The Purest, For It Drives Everything Else From Our Awareness And Focuses Us As Perfectly As We Can Ever Be Focused.

I've Got Evil In Me As Much As Anyone, Some Desires That Scare Me. Even If I Don't Give In To Them, Just Having Them Scares The Living Bejesus Out Of Me Sometimes. I'm No Saint, The Way You Kid About. But I've Always Walked The Line, Walked That Goddamned Line. It's A Mean Mother Of A Line, Straight And Narrow, Sharp As A Razor, Cuts Right Into You When You Walk It Long Enough. You're Always Bleeding On That Line, And Sometimes You Wonder Why You Don't Just Step Off And Walk In The Cool Grass.

Human Beings Can Always Be Relied Upon To Exert, With Vigor, Their God-given Right To Be Stupid.

If I Drive Myself To The Brink Of My Ability, Then I Don't Get Stale Or Bored.

He Felt ... A Suspicion-no, A Conviction-than He Had Been Abandoned, Forgotten, And That No One In The Whole World Cared Or Would Ever Care Enough About Him To Really Find Out What He Was Like And What His Dreams Were. He Was An Outcast, A Creature Somehow Vastly Different From All Other People, An Object Of Scorn And Derision, An Outsider, Secretly Loathed And Ridiculed By Everyone Who Met Him, Even By Those Few Who Professed To Love Him.

...at It's Best Fiction Is Medicine.

When We Don't Allow Ourselves To Hope, We Don't Allow Ourselves To Have Purpose. Without Purpose, Without Meaning, Life Is Dark. We've No Light Within, And We're Just Living To Die.

On The Road That I Have Taken, One Day Walking I Awaken, Amazed To See Where I've Come, Where I'm Going, Where I'm From.

Maybe I'm Needy, Neurotic, Paranoid. Under The Circumstances, Of Course, If I Weren't Needy, Neurotic, And Paranoid, I'd Obviously Be Psychotic.

Here In The Summer Desert, Winter Found My Blood

I'm Small, I'm Young - And I'm So Different. You've Always Respected That Difference, And You've Always Trusted It. Trust Me Now. There's A Reason I Am The Way I Am, And There's A Reason I Was Born To You. There's Always A Reason. We Belong Together.

Not Funny Ha Ha, Funny Weird.

Nothing Is Worse Than Being Alone On The Evening Of The Day When One's Cow Has Exploded.

The Human Species Was Too Fond Of Lying, Cheating, Envy, Ignorance, Self-pity, Self-righteousness, And Utopian Visions That Always Led To Mass Murder-but Until And If It Destroyed Itself, It Harbored The Potential To Become Nobler, To Take Responsibility For Its Actions, To Live And Let Live, And To Earn The Stewardship Of The Earth.

Life's Mysterious, Strange, And Full Of Wonders - And Only A Fool Withdraws From It Willingly And Lets It Pass Him By.

Bunny Slippers Remind Me Of Who I Am.you Can't Get A Swelled Head If You Wear Bunny Slippers. You Can't Lose Your Sense Of Perspective And Start Acting Like A Star Or A Rich Lady If You Keep On Wearing Bunny Slippers. Besides, Bunny Slippers Give Me Confidence Because They're So Jaunty. They Make A Statement; They Say, 'nothing The World Does To Me Can Ever Get Me So Far Down That I Can't Be Silly And Frivolous.

Humanity Was Drawn To Turmoil And Self-destruction As Inevitably As The Earth Was Drawn To Complete Its Annual Revolution Of The Sun.

Despair Is Good. Despair Can Be The Nadir Of One Life And The Starting Point Of An Ascent Into Another, Better One.

Evil Men Often Easy To Mislead, Because They Have Spent So Long Deceiving That They No Longer Recognise The Truth And Mistake Deseption For It.

What Year These Events Transpired Is Of No Consequence. Where They Occured Is Not Important. The Time Is Always, And The Place Is Everywhere.

Too Many Dogs Continue To Be Abused And Abandond - One Is Too Many - And People Continue To Kill People For Money And Envy And No Reason At All. 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 Recognised, And People Live In Loneliness Because They Cannot Believe They Are Loved

What Doesn't Quicken Dies. That's An Indisputable Truth Of Life.

Humanity Is A Parade Of Fools, And I Am At The Front Of It, Twirling A Baton.

If You Want To Publish Two Books A Year Under Your Own Name And Your Publisher Doesn't, Maybe You Need A Different Publisher.

Do As Little Harm To Others As You Can; Make Any Sacrifice For Your True Friends; Be Responsible For Yourself And Ask Nothing Of Others; And Grab All The Fun You Can. Don't Give Much Thought To Yesterday, Don't Worry About Tomorrow, Live In The Moment, And Trust That Your Existence Has Meaning Even When The World Seems To Be All Blind Chance And Chaos. When Life Lands A Hammer Blow In Your Face, Do Your Best To Respond To The Hammer As If It Had Been A Cream Pie.

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.

A Long Walk And Grooming With A Well-mannered Dog Is A Zen Experience That Leaves You Refreshed And In A Creative Frame Of Mind.

Because People See Violence On The Movie Screen, They're Not Going To Go Out And Hold Up A Liquor Store And Kill Somebody. It Really Doesn't Correlate.

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.

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.

If You Have To Pay The Bills, And You Write Something You're Not Proud Of, Use A Pen-name For That.

The Mockery Of Friends Is Affectionate, And Inoculates Against Foolishness.

In Spite Of Where We Were, How We Had Gotten Here And Why We Had Come, I Felt That At This Moment Of Our Lives, This Place Was Exactly Where We Belonged. We Were Not Drifting But Rising, Rising Toward Something Right And Of Significance.

I've A Long List Of Things I Don't Know How I've Done, But I've Done Them. In The End, It's Always About Perseverance.

Like Children, Dogs Want Discipline And Are Most Secure When They Have Rules To Live By. The Happiest Dogs Are Those With Gentle Masters Who Quietly But Firmly Demand Respect.

Rules To Live By

The Destruction That Barbarians Leave Behind Has A Grim Fascination, Doesn't It? We're Reminded How Thin Is The Veneer Of Civilization.

When I Am Battered And Oppressed By The World That Humanity Has Made - Which Is Difference From The World That Is Was Given - My Primary Defense, My Consolation, Is The Absurdity Of That World

Even As A Child, She Had Preferred Night To Day, Had Enjoyed Sitting Out In The Yard After Sunset, Under The Star-speckled Sky Listening To Frogs And Crickets. Darkness Soothed. It Softened The Sharp Edges Of The World, Toned Down The Too-harsh Colors. With The Coming Of Twilight, The Sky Seemed To Recede; The Universe Expanded. The Night Was Bigger Than The Day, And In Its Realm, Life Seemed To Have More Possibilities.

...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

Only The Human Spirit Can Act With Volition And Consciously Change Itself; It Is The Only Thing In All Creation That Is Not Entirely At The Mercy Of Forces Outside Itself.

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.

I Think It's The People Who Have No Doubt That Every Word They Put Down Is Gold That Probably Don't Write Very Well.

The Biggest Advice Is Being True To What You Want To Do. Don't Worry If Other People Understand It Or Don't Understand It. If What You're Doing Has Merit, It Will Find Its Way.

In A Crunch A Man's Reputation Never Counts For As Much As It Ought To.

Are You Prepared For The First Wound?

Less Real Than Such Threats As A Man With A Gun, A Woman With A Knife, Or A U.s. Senator With An Idea.

Being Paid Well For Something You Love To Do - It's A Grace.

Something You Love

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