The City Quotes

“After you have suffered great losses and known much pain, it is not cowardice to wish to live henceforth with a minimum of suffering. And one form of heroism, about which few if any films will be made, is having the courage to live without bitterness when bitterness is justified, having the strength to persevere even when perseverance seems unlikely to be rewarded, having the resolution to find profound meaning in life when it seems the most meaningless.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“In our lives, we come to moments of great significance that we fail to recognize, the meaning of which sometimes does not occur to us for many years. Each of us has his agenda and focuses on it, and therefore we are often blind to what is before our eyes.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“Riots come and go, wars come and go, but under the tumult, day after day, century after century, millions of people are doing nice things for one another, making sacrifices, mostly small things, but it’s all those little kindnesses that hold civilization together, all those people who live quiet lives and never make the news.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“When you keep a secret from those closest to you, even with the best of motives, there is a danger that you will create a smaller life within your main life. The first secret will spin off other secrets that also must be kept, complicated webs of evasion that grow into elaborate architectures of repressed truths and subterfuge, until you discover that you must live two narratives at once. Because deception requires both bold lies and lies of omission, it stains the soul, muddies the conscience, blurs the vision, and puts you at risk of headlong descent into greater darkness.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“There’s something you need to understand, Jonah. For every person who’s stealing and setting fires and turning over police cars, there are three or four others in the same neighborhood who want no part of it, who’re more afraid of lawbreakers than they are of the law.” “Doesn’t look that way.” “Because the TV only shows you the ones who’re doing it. The news isn’t all the news, Jonah. Not by a long shot. It’s just what reporters want to tell you about. Riots come and go, wars come and go, but under the tumult, day after day, century after century, millions of people are doing nice things for one another, making sacrifices, mostly small things, but it’s all those little kindnesses that hold civilization together, all those people who live quiet lives and never make the news.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“In the beginning was the word. Before all else, the word. So we speak as if words matter, because they do.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“When someone gives you a special gift, never treat it lightly. If you treat it like a treasure, then it’ll be one.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“One of the best things about growing up is that, if you can learn from experience, you come to the realization that two things matter more than anything else, truth with a lowercase t and Truth with an uppercase T. You have to tell the truth, demand the truth from others, recognize lies and refute them; you've got to see the world as it is, not as you want it to be, not as others who wish to dominate you might say it is. Embracing truth frees you from false expectations, fruitless pursuits, disappointment, pointless anger, envy, despair. And the bigger kind of Truth, that life has meaning, is the surest source of happiness, because it allows you to recognize your true value and potential, encourages a humility that brings peace. Most important, the big-T Truth makes it possible for you to love others for who they are, always without consideration of what they might do for you, and only from such relationships arise those rare moments of pure joy that shine so bright in memory.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“Creation moves and astonishes if you let it. When I realize how unlikely it is that anything at all should live on this world spun together from dust and hot gases, that creatures of almost infinite variety should at night look up at the stars, I know that it’s all more fragile than it appears, and I think maybe the only thing that keeps the Earth alive and turning is our love for it.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“Hold every moment sacred. Give each clarity and meaning, each the weight of thine awareness, each its true and due fulfillment. —Thomas Mann, The Beloved Returns”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“The dark makes the light stuff brighter.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“being admired gives you more power than being feared.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“No matter what happens, everything will be all right in the long run.’ ”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“There is no fate, only free will, and we were just in the way of other people's free will when they decided to do the Devil's work.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“one form of heroism, about which few if any films will be made, is having the courage to live without bitterness when bitterness is justified, having the strength to persevere even when perseverance seems unlikely to be rewarded, having the resolution to find profound meaning in life when it seems the most meaningless.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“I'd rather live the now than talk about the was.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“Trouble was coming, sure, but it's always coming, and meanwhile it's best to live with a smile.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“I'd always had an ear for beauty, and maybe I'd had an eye for it as well, but until that day, I'd not recognized that the truth in great music could be found also in great art, that the heart could be lifted and the mind sharpened equally by both.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“In our lives, we come to moments of great significance that we fail to recognize, the meaning of which does not occur to us for many years. Each of us has his agenda and focuses on it, and therefore we are often blind to what is before our eyes.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“When I noticed that some of the gray-haired ladies had tears in their eyes, I understood for the first time why music matters so much, how it reminds us of who we are and where we came from, of all the good times and the sadness, too.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“When you keep a secret from those closest to you, even with the best of motives, there is a danger that you will create a smaller life within your main life. The first secret will spin off other secrets that also must be kept, complicated webs of evasion that grow into elaborate architectures of repressed truths and subterfuge, until you discover that you must live two narratives at once.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“In fact, time teaches us that the musical score of life oscillates between that of Psycho and that of The Sound of Music, with by far the greatest number of our days lived to the strains of an innocuous and modestly budgeted picture, sometimes a romance, sometimes a light comedy, sometimes a little art film of puzzling purpose and elusive meaning.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“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.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“He had to lie to himself about life, pretend it was less hard than it really was, and then press forward by one slippery means or another, all the while deluding himself into believing that he was conquering the world.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“Maybe if the death had occurred on the other side of the street, I’d be watching from here with different kids, acting as foolish. Maybe the difference between horror and holiday was just the width of an ordinary street.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“When we are transported either by Mozart or Glenn Miller, we find ourselves in the presence of the ineffable, for which all words are so inadequate that to attempt to describe it, even with effusive praise and words of perfect beauty, is to engage in blasphemy.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“news is never all the news, only what they want to show you,”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“To generations of the willfully blind, true beauty can remain unseen in plain sight, but beauty sooner or later asserts itself—always, always, always—and is at last recognized, because there’s so damn little of it.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“That’s life. Always something, more good than bad, but always interesting if you’re paying attention.”
― Dean Koontz, The City

“To have your life blow up four times before you're thirty would take something out of anyone, and I think it drained from my mom just enough hope that she never quite built her confidence back to what it once had been.”
― Dean Koontz, The City