Best Watchers Quotes by Dean Koontz

"The innocence, enthusiasms, joys, and voracities of youth can be recalled but perhaps never fully regained."

"He needed to release that tension through violent action, and the killing of a few snakes-no loss to anyone-seemed the perfect prescription for his distress."

"He began to shake, and the gun kept straying from the target, and he could not find the will to fire."

"A man could be happy here. Yeah, a man could be very happy."

"Cats go where they want, do what they want, take what they want. Cats are aggressive and self-sufficient by nature. Mice, on the other hand, don't have an ounce of aggression in them."

"His smile had once charmed women, though not recently."

"Something uncanny was happening; he shivered not unpleasantly, as before."

"Trying to keep his eye on the telltale tremble of the brush to his right, abandoning his backpack and keeping only the gun, Travis raced up the steep trail, and the retriever ran behind him."

"Nora was in the kitchen, gripped by mouselike fear."

"Merely to contemplate making major changes in Violet Devon's house was dizzying, exhilarating."

"She did not feel safe until his van was out of sight. Actually, even then, she did not feel safe."

"Being sent to another public telephone to receive 'the details' could mean only one thing: they had a job for him already, two in one day!"

"Books were permitted-if Violet had first approved of them-because, for one thing, books were educational."

"Many times over the years, especially at night but even in the middle of the day, Nora had been overcome by a feeling that the floor of the bedroom was going to collapse under all the furniture."

"More than ever, this was her sanctuary. Without fail, upon passing through the door and seeing what she had wrought, her spirits lifted and she found some surcease from her troubles."

"At last, the retriever shook itself, sneezed once, and slowly came forward."

"For the first time in three years, Travis Cornell felt needed, felt a deep connection with another living creature."

"But no matter how painful it was sometimes, life was (he now realized) nonetheless precious."

"You amaze me and scare me. I can't figure where you came from or how you got to be what you are, but you couldn't have come where you're more needed."

"Habit and self-defense kept me emotionally isolated."

"Most people believe psychoanalysis is a cure for unhappiness."

"I loved my big brother more than anyone in the world."

"Was there no one who could love a mouse and treat it gently?"

"You're a little nervous about me, sure, I understand that, I really do. But believe me, this is what you need, girl, this is going to turn your life upside down, nothing's ever going to be the same again, and that's the best thing could happen to you."

"Life's too short to waste all of it working."

"I'm going to help you, Nora. I'll be moving in for a while. It's going to be fun."

"She considered unplugging the telephone, thus foiling Streck, but she was afraid she might need it."

"Throughout the morning and early afternoon, the retriever had done nothing amazing. In fact, his I'm-just-an-ordinary-dumb-dog behavior was so convincing that Travis wondered if the animal's nearly human intelligence came only in brief flashes, sort of the beneficial equivalent of epileptic seizures."

"Einstein's extraordinary nature, though seldom revealed, was no longer open to debate."

"The change from snarling dog to affectionate pet was so sudden that everyone was startled."

"By being aggressive, by looking and acting a little dangerous, he was accustomed to getting his way. Travis despised such men."

"Travis began to realize something was wrong. The runner's self-righteous anger was overdone—as if he had been caught in a shameful act and was trying to conceal his guilt by going immediately and aggressively on the offensive."

"She smiled, but nervously. Though she wore her hair straight and lank, though she used no makeup, she was quite attractive."

"Sitting there under a ton-weight of shyness, she looked so vulnerable that Travis could not just get up, walk away, and leave her with her problems."

"He and Einstein continued their walk through the park. Later, they went to the beach, where the retriever seemed astounded by the endless vistas of rolling sea and by the breakers foaming on the sand."

"Staring at the ocean, he always felt that the ebb and flow of blood through his veins and arteries was in perfect sympathy with the rhythm of the tides."

"Einstein was guarding him, staying back out of range of a kick, but ready to tear at the runner if the guy was foolish enough to attempt to leave the corner."

"He's already vain," Travis said. "If he were any more vain, he'd be impossible to live with."

"Sometimes it almost seems he can understand every word you're saying."

"You're looking good," Johnny said. "Taking care of yourself, I see. Still mean as a snake?"

"I'll never do time," Vince said, meaning that he knew prison was not part of his destiny.

"I've only known her a few days, but damn if I don't think I'm falling in love."

"That's strange, all right. Something like that would be in the newspapers."

"She's a little uppity, that one, but she can just about suck your brains out through your cock."

"I don't know what gets into me," she said. "You're good to me, Johnny, and I hate myself when I act like that."

"And when I think about all that vitality, intelligence, and love of life being suppressed for thirty years, I want to cry."

"But I'm not here out of pity, for God's sake! I'm here because I like being with you, I really do, I like you very much."

"The thing to do was just relax and enjoy it."

"If there's any justice, Violet Devon is sweating in Hell tonight."

"She wished she had not undone the hairstyle that Melanie had given her a couple of days ago."

"Like a sentimental high school girl, she slept in the five-hundred-dollar dress."

"I never liked her, I thought she was a narrow-minded, totally self-involved woman who was at least slightly... well, mentally unstable."

"She needed to hear her aunt condemned by someone else."

"Don't apologize for breaking through that iron shell you've been in all your life."

"I'm flabbergasted. So you never really understood why she was bitterly misanthropic."

"I can't entirely blame poor George because I don't think he found much love and affection at home."

"The thought of carrying George Olmstead's name through life repelled her."

"My God, Nora, this is no hobby painting. This is the real thing. This is art."

"I think you could build one hell of a reputation."

"I can't absorb it all. I keep having to fight off attacks of dizziness."

"Einstein listened to them with interest, as if he understood what they were saying."

"Their tired humor could not mask the fact that they were weary and uncomfortable."

"I'd expect rooms a little bigger than these."

"Only some asshole stoned on PCP would be violent enough to do something like this."

"But Jesus. Jesus. Travis stared in awe at the retriever, and a chill swept through him."

"Einstein vigorously wagged his tail-which Travis interpreted as a "yes" with a special edge of anxiety."

"The prospects for more direct communication looked bleak during the first few sessions, but the big breakthrough was not long in coming."

"You started taking over the minute you got here, didn't you? Before you even talked to me about it?"

"We're making sure your people understand that they must not talk of anything they've seen here tonight, not even to their own wives."

"I don't want anyone in jail. That's why I want to be sure they grasp the consequences."

"Roll up the windows, so we'll have total privacy."

"Tell me now, and I'll stay off the case. I won't interfere."

"In court I'd claim I had to choose between breaching the national security and betraying the trust of the people."

"By pulling the dog to a new level of awareness, we are inevitably raising our own awareness as well."

"If we can do these amazing things, if we can bring such a wonder into the world, then there's something of profound value in us."

"This incredible sense that humankind is on its way to godhood-and that we deserve to get there."

"Imagine the president of the United States presenting the Soviet premier with a one-year-old golden retriever as a gift."

"Einstein's willingness to sit for hours, focusing on the books, seemed proof that he was actually reading them and not just looking at the cute drawings."

"Nora and Einstein were sitting on chairs at the kitchen table. Travis paused in his cooking to watch the dog take the quiz."

"Travis would have enjoyed taking a more active role in the dog's education, but he could see that working intensely with Einstein was having an enormously beneficial effect on Nora, and he did not want to interfere."

"Perhaps giving the gift of literacy to the dog was extremely satisfying to her."

"Her great patience was that of a good mother dealing with a child, and she often spoke to Einstein so tenderly and affectionately that she sounded as if she were addressing her own much-loved offspring."

"In light of his previous criminal record, Streck had changed his mind about pursuing a plea of innocence and waging a defense against charges of attempted rape, assault, and breaking and entering."

"Einstein discovered there were Mickey Mouse picture books for children and comic books, and the dog was as jubilant about that discovery as Nora was about the resolution of the charges against Arthur Streck."

"Nora became more relaxed and outgoing as she worked with Einstein."

"She laughed more often and more engagingly. In conversation, she met Travis's eyes and seldom looked shyly away from him, as she had done previously."

"Now she had a chance to give of herself, and she was generous with her time and energy, and in her own generosity she found joy."

"Einstein lifted one hind leg and peed on the bed."

"If it's not needles you're afraid of—is it the vet?"

"Hell, of course! You're not afraid of the vet—but of who the vet might report you to."

"Maybe on the inner lip. They tattoo racehorses on the inner lip to identify them and prevent ringers from being run."

"More than anything else, Einstein's afraid of going back to the lab."

"Einstein is about the number-one miracle of the twentieth century."

"Each time he said something even slightly optimistic about the future, he found himself knocking on wood to counter malicious fates."

"The dreams of the previous two nights were not repeated."

"He was charmed every time Einstein did something to remind him."

"Although the constant shadow of certain death looms over every day, the pleasures and joys of life can be so fine and deeply affecting that the heart is nearly stilled by astonishment."

"The law is like a string, fixed at both ends but with a great deal of play in it—very loose, the line of the law—so you can stretch it this way or that."

"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."

"A sixty-thousand-dollar getaway car? That's going on the run in style."