“
There's something ugly about the flawless.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Sacred (Kenzie & Gennaro, #3))
“
What if I don’t choose you, Kellan? What will you do?”
He looked away, a tear rolling down his cheek. “I’ll leave, Kiera. I’ll leave, and you and Denny can have your happily ever after.” He looked back at me. “You wouldn’t even need to tell him about me. Eventually, the two of you…” his voice broke and another tear fell on his cheek, “the two of you would get married, and have children, and have a great life.”
I fought back a sob. “And you? What happens to you in that scenario?”
“I…get by. And I miss you, every day,” he whispered.
”
”
S.C. Stephens (Thoughtless (Thoughtless, #1))
“
I think in the end, you would have stayed with me, out of obligation...or maybe comfort. Maybe I was safe to you, and you needed to feel that. I know how scared you get of the unknown. To you...I must be kind of a security blanket. Do you see now, how that doesn't work for me? I don't want to be there, simply because the idea of me being gone is too...scary. I want to be someone's everything. I want fire and passion, and love that's returned, equally. I want to be someone's heart... Even if it means breaking my own.
”
”
S.C. Stephens (Thoughtless (Thoughtless, #1))
“
And he hated himself and hated her,too, for the ruin they'd made of each other.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (The Given Day (Coughlin #1))
“
Sobriety is okay enough," Denny says, "but someday, I'd like to live a life based on doing good stuff instead of just not doing bad stuff. You know?
”
”
Chuck Palahniuk (Choke)
“
Which would be worse, to live as a monster or to die as a good man?
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Where do we go from here?"-Kiera
"We go nowhere."-Denny
”
”
S.C. Stephens (Thoughtless (Thoughtless, #1))
“
There are so many more important things to worry about than how you're perceived by strangers.
”
”
Dennis Lehane
“
Dennis Hutch had stepped up into the top seat when its founder had died of a lethal overdose of brick wall, taken while under the influence of a Ferrari and a bottle of tequila.
”
”
Douglas Adams (The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul (Dirk Gently, #2))
“
Happiness doesn't lie in conspicuous consumption and the relentless amassing of useless crap. Happiness lies in the person sitting beside you and your ability to talk to them. Happiness is clear-headed human interaction and empathy. Happiness is home. And home is not a house-home is a mythological conceit. It is a state of mind. A place of communion and unconditional love. It is where, when you cross its threshold, you finally feel at peace.
”
”
Dennis Lehane
“
Dennis the Peasant: Listen. Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
Arthur: Be quiet!
Dennis: You can't expect to wield supreme power just 'cause some watery tart threw a sword at you!
”
”
Graham Chapman (Monty Python and the Holy Grail (Book): Mønti Pythøn Ik Den Hølie Gräilen (Bøk))
“
This world can only give me reminders of what I don't have, can never have, didn't have for long enough.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
He wanted to ask her what sound a heart made when it broke from pleasure, when just the sight of someone filled you the way food, blood, and air never could, when you felt as if you'd been born for only one moment and this, for whatever reason, was it.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Some people will never learn anything, for this reason, because they understand everything too soon.
”
”
Alexander Pope (Miscellanies in Verse and Prose. by Alexander Pope, Esq; And Dean Swift. in One Volume. Viz. the Strange and Deplorable Frensy of Mr. John Dennis. ... ... Several More Epigrams, Epitaphs, and Poems.)
“
There are threads in our lives. You pull one, and everything else gets affected.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Mystic River)
“
Dan thought of love as defined by books, cobwebbed and hidden from view by the past. Too bad a love like that didn't actually exist. In the twentieth century one had to fake it.
”
”
Dennis Cooper (Closer)
“
That's the thing about being a victim; you start to think it'll happen to you on a regular basis. It's living with the reality of your own vulnerability, and it sucks.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (A Drink Before the War (Kenzie & Gennaro, #1))
“
Your first family is your blood family and you always be true to that. That means something. But there's another family and that's the kind you go out and find. Maybe even by accident sometimes. And they're as much blood as your first family. Maybe more so, because they don't have to look out for you and they don't have to love you. They choose to.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (The Given Day (Coughlin #1))
“
The brain controls pain. It controls fear. Sleep. Empathy. Hunger. Everything we associate with the heart or the soul or the nervous system is actually controlled by the brain. Everything. What if you could control it?
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Clearly angry with himself, Denny shook his head. “You needed me, and I wasn’t there for you. And I’m really sorry. That was pretty shitty of me.”
“Are you kidding?” Incredulous, Kellan pointed over at me. “I slept with your girlfriend…repeatedly.” I flinched, and Abby squeezed my hand a little tighter.
Denny frowned. “Well, that was pretty shitty of you.
”
”
S.C. Stephens (Reckless (Thoughtless, #3))
“
You've learned that every good lie is threaded with truth and every accepted truth leaks lies.
”
”
Dennis Lehane
“
When I started writing
I was a sick teenaged
fuck inside who partly
thought I was the new
Marquis de Sade, a body
doomed to communicate
with Satan who was us-
ing my sickness as his
home away from home,
and there’s your proof.
”
”
Dennis Cooper
“
Hey, Adam,” I said.
I thought you’d want to know that Warren and Darryl made it out of the vampire den alive.”
I sucked in my breath. “You didn’t actually agree to their meeting on Marsilia’s grounds?”
He laughed. “No, it just sounded better than saying they made it out of Denny’s alive. It might not be romantic, but it’s open all night and set in the middle of a brightly lit parking lot with no dark places for skulking parties to ambush from.
”
”
Patricia Briggs (Bone Crossed (Mercy Thompson, #4))
“
If you are deemed insane, then all actions that would oherwise prove you are not do, in actuality, fall into the framework of an insane person’s actions. Your sound protests constitute denial. Your valid fears are deemed paranoia. Your survival instincts are labeled defense mechanisms. It’s a no-win situation. It’s a death penalty really.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Life isn't happily ever after... It's work. The person you love is rarely worthy of how big your love is. Because no one is worthy of that and maybe no one deserves that burden of it, either. You'll be let down. You'll be disappointed and have your trust broken and have a lot of real sucky days. You lose more than you win. You hate the person you love as much as you love him. But you roll up your sleeves and work - at everything - because that's what growing older is.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Mystic River)
“
A recent police study found that you're much more likely to get shot by a fat cop if you run.
”
”
Dennis Miller
“
In Greek tragedy, they fall from great heights. In noir, they fall from the curb.
”
”
Dennis Lehane
“
How many psychiatrists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?” “I don’t know. How many?” “Eight.” “Why?” “Oh, stop overanalyzing it.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
I go on the presumption that everyone's full of shit until proven otherwise, and this usually serves me in good stead.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (A Drink Before the War (Kenzie & Gennaro, #1))
“
Wow!” said Dennis, as though nobody in their wildest dreams could hope for more than being thrown into a storm-tossed, fathoms-deep lake, and pushed out of it again by a giant sea monster.
”
”
J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, #4))
“
People would say bad things about you, because it is the only way their insignificant self can feel better than you.
”
”
Dennis E. Adonis
“
Maybe there are some things we were put on this earth not to know.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you’re a good person is like expecting a bull not to attack you because you’re a vegetarian.
”
”
Dennis Wholey
“
We do have CIA agent Lily Carson in the room. You overseas folks know Lily very well." Wesley Bromwell joked. "Oxford University hasn't been the same since Lily left England with her masters degree.
”
”
Dennis K. Hausker (Secrets: in a corrupted society)
“
Voting is not a right. It is a method used to determine which politician was most able to brainwash you.
”
”
Dennis E. Adonis
“
Everyone sees different things.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Happiness comes in moments, & then it's gone until the next time. Could be years. But sadness settles it.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Mystic River)
“
Everyone should have health insurance? I say everyone should have health care. I'm not selling insurance.
”
”
Dennis Kucinich
“
All happy people are grateful. Ungrateful people cannot be happy. We tend to think that being unhappy leads people to complain, but it’s truer to say that complaining leads to people becoming unhappy.
”
”
Dennis Prager
“
Many of us live in denial of who we truly are because we fear losing someone or something-and there are times that if we don't rock the boat, too often the one we lose is ourselves...It feels good to be accepted, loved, and approved of by others, but often the membership fee to belong to that club is far too high of a price to pay.
”
”
Dennis Merritt Jones
“
I had always wanted to love Eve as Denny loved her, but I never had because I was afraid. She was my rain. She was my unpredictable element. She was my fear. But a racer should not be afraid of the rain; a racer should embrace the rain. I, alone, could manifest a change around me. By changing my mood, my energy, I allowed Eve to regard me differently. And while I cannot say that I am a master of my own destiny, I can say that I have experienced a glimpse of mastery, and I know what I have to work toward.
”
”
Garth Stein (The Art of Racing in the Rain)
“
Like almost every truly horrible thing that has ever happened in the history of our world, the end also began with a kiss.
”
”
Dennis Sharpe (Destroyer of Worlds)
“
Being a woman is worse than being a farmer there is so much harvesting and crop spraying to be done: legs to be waxed, underarms shaved, eyebrows plucked, feet pumiced, skin exfoliated and moisturised, spots cleansed, roots dyed, eyelashes tinted, nails filed, cellulite massaged, stomach muscles exercised.
The whole performance is so highly tuned you only need to neglect it for a few days for the whole thing to go to seed. Sometimes I wonder what I would be like if left to revert to nature — with a full beard and handlebar moustache on each shin Dennis Healey eyebrows face a graveyard of dead skin cells spots erupting long curly fingernails like Struwelpeter blind as bat and stupid runt of species as no contact lenses flabby body flobbering around. Ugh ugh. Is it any wonder girls have no confidence?
”
”
Helen Fielding (Bridget Jones’s Diary (Bridget Jones, #1))
“
How are you supposed to feel if you are forced to do what you would have done anyway?
”
”
Dennis E. Taylor (We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse, #1))
“
I loved this woman the way you love ... well, nothing," he said, a note of suprise in his voice. "You can’t compare that kind of love to anything, can you? It’s its own unique gift.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Wait, Korban, are you vexed?"
"That woman, she confounds, and insults me."
"Women can perplex as easily as changing a cloak."
"The princess is delicate, not like our women."
"Yes, she is very delicate, pretty like a sweet flower."
"Well, I care not for her. I will think no more about her, ever.
”
”
Dennis K. Hausker (Primitives of Kar)
“
She blew a stream of smoke up at the empty clotheslines. 'These silly dreams you have when you're young. I mean, what, Katie and Brendan Harris were going ot make a life in Las Vegas? How long would that little Eden have lasted? Maybe they'd be on their second trailer park, second kid, but it would have hit them sooner or later - life isn't happily ever after and golden sunsets and shit like that. It's work. The person you love is rarely worthy of how big your love is. Because no one is worthy of that and maybe no one deserves the burden of it, either. You'll be let down. You'll be disappointed and have your trust broken and have a lot of real sucky days. You lose more than you win. You hate the person you love as much as you love him. But, shit, you roll up your sleeves and work - at everything -because that's what growing older is.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Mystic River)
“
Why is it I feel a new nostalgia for the era of the guillotine?
”
”
Dennis Cooper (The Marbled Swarm)
“
But as the years passed, he missed her more, not less, and his need for her became a cut that would not scar over, would not stop leaking.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
It's hard to close the door on optimistic expectations when you love someone.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (A Drink Before the War (Kenzie & Gennaro, #1))
“
One of the largest barbarians spouted after donning Trantan royalty clothing, "I would be a great nobleman. I look splendid.
”
”
Dennis K. Hausker (Primitives of Kar)
“
Happiness comes in small doses folks. It's a cigarette butt, or a chocolate chip cookie or a five second orgasm. You come, you smoke the butt you eat the cookie you go to sleep wake up and go back to fucking work the next morning, THAT'S IT! End of fucking list!
”
”
Denis Leary
“
The world didn't give a shit. It didn't bestow. It took
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
I always start writing with a clean piece of paper and a dirty mind.
”
”
Patrick Dennis
“
She looked at him like it physically hurt her not to speak, and yet she stayed silent.
”
”
Dennis Sharpe (First Boy)
“
Men. If you give them half a chance, they'll fuck you over just to prove they can.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Mystic River)
“
Like all men who look this good, Frank has no interest in women.
”
”
Dennis Sharpe (Blood & Spirits (The Coming Storm, #1))
“
I take issue with many people's description of people being "Illegal" Immigrants. There aren't any illegal Human Beings as far as I'm concerned.
”
”
Dennis Kucinich
“
After Kellan begged me for a final kiss, Griffin murmured, “Your wedding day is Thanksgiving. That’s convenient.” He pointed at Kellan. “You probably won’t forget your anniversary.” He looked over at Anna. “We shoulda done that. I already forgot ours.”
Anna smirked at Griffin while Kellan’s lip twitched. “Uh, it won’t always be on Thanksgiving, Griff.”
He looked horribly confused. “Huh? Yeah, it will.”
“Kellan bit his lip. I could tell he was trying really hard not to laugh, since laughing hurt. “Thanksgiving isn’t on the same day every year. It moves around.”
Griffin glared at Kellan. “Don’t even try fucking with me, Kell.” He tapped his finger to his head. “I’m on to you.”
I heard Matt and Evan snigger with Justin and Denny. My dad stared at the ceiling as he shook his head. I couldn’t contain my giggle; poor Kellan had to take long, slow exhales so he didn’t laugh with everyone else. “Griff, I’m not . . .
”
”
S.C. Stephens (Reckless (Thoughtless, #3))
“
You don't know what you can accomplish if you never try.
”
”
Dennis K. Hausker (Echo Three Tango)
“
Abdul and Mohamed sat down, chilling the conversation at the table. They spoke in Urdu, unaware Lily understood them. When her expression changed subtly, Abdul noticed and switched to speaking English with a mundane comment.
”
”
Dennis K. Hausker (Secrets: in a corrupted society)
“
I normally can't stand vice-free people. They conflate a narcissistic instinct for self-preservation with moral superiority. Plus they suck the life right out of a party.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Moonlight Mile (Kenzie & Gennaro, #6))
“
I held her, he wanted to say, and if I knew for certain that all it would take to hold her again would be to die, then I couldn't raise the gun to my head fast enough.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
The '60s redefined narcissism as idealism.
”
”
Dennis Prager
“
What molds us is what maims us.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (The Given Day (Coughlin #1))
“
She smiled darkly and shook her head. 'I'm not crazy. I'm not. Of course what else would a crazy person claim? That's the Kafkaesque genius of it all. If you're not crazy but people have told the world you are, then all your protests to the contrary just underscore their point. Do you see what I'm saying?
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
People can become addicted to fame, money, and attention as deeply as they become addicted to drugs.
”
”
Dennis Prager (Think a Second Time)
“
Since I doubt, I think; since I think, I exist.
”
”
Dennis E. Taylor (We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse, #1))
“
You just don't know writers. They'll use anything, anybody. They'll eat their young.
”
”
Dennis Potter (The Singing Detective)
“
She was my rain. She was my unpredictable element. She was my fear. But a racer should not be afraid of rain; a racer should embrace the rain.
”
”
Garth Stein (The Art of Racing in the Rain)
“
She was afraid of all that and so much more, but what terrified her most was inside of her, an insect of unnatural intelligence who’d been living in her brain her entire life, playing with it, clicking across it, wrenching loose its cables on a whim.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Life is a banquet and most poor s.o.b.'s are starving to death." Auntie Mame
”
”
Patrick Dennis (Auntie Mame: An Irreverent Escapade (Auntie Mame, #1))
“
When a child grows old enough to know J.R.R. Tolkien was just staring at a typewriter, the truth can be a wounding exposé.
”
”
Dennis Cooper (The Marbled Swarm)
“
For some offenses, there is only retribution." Nora Hawks, "One Woman's Vengeance.
”
”
Dennis R. Miller
“
Marriage to the groom does not means that his heart belongs to the bride.
”
”
Dennis E. Adonis
“
I like flat black. It doesn't try to explain anything, and it's been hip since before I was born, I guess.
”
”
Dennis Cooper (Closer)
“
I'm a talentless but popular young singer and I have the feeling someone is watching me. I use the term loosely because I have few feelings, and even they're too simple, like primary colors.
”
”
Dennis Cooper (Closer)
“
Emotional. Out of his mind grateful. Anything goes. I love you, I love you, I love you.
”
”
Dennis Cooper (Period)
“
We were supposed to grow old together, Dolores. Have kids. Take walks under old trees. I wanted to watch the lines etch themselves into your flesh and know when each and every one of them appeared. Die together.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
When I was young, I asked my priest how to get to heaven and still protect yourself from all the evil in the world. He told me what God told His children;'You are sheep among wolves, be wise as the serpent, yet innocent as doves.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Gone, Baby, Gone (Kenzie & Gennaro, #4))
“
Make me laugh. Make me cry. Tell me my place in the world. Lift me out of my skin and place me in another. Show me places I have never visited and carry me to the ends of time and space. Give my demons names and help me to confront them. Demonstrate for me possibilities I've never thought of and present me with heroes who will give me courage and hope. Ease my sorrows and increase my joy. Teach me compassion. Entertain and enchant and enlighten me.
Tell me a story.
”
”
Dennis O'Neil
“
Sympathy’s easy. You have sympathy for starving children swatting at flies on the late-night commercials. Sympathy is easy because it comes from a position of power. Empathy is getting down on your knees and looking someone else in the eye and realizing you could be them, and that all that separates you is luck.
”
”
Dennis Lehane
“
and she was so simply his love, his girl, watching him approach as if she were memorizing him and his walk and those flowers and this moment, and he wanted to ask her what sound a heart made when it broke from pleasure, when just the sight of someone filled you the way food, blood, and air never could...
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
“
Love: a hybrid emotion made up of various other emotions collaged by some weak individual's mind to try to quell a particular horror that's not been wiped out by more standardized symbols like Christ, etc. Nietzsche, right? Whatever.
”
”
Dennis Cooper (Try)
“
Living in a small town...is like living in a large family of rather uncongenial relations. Sometimes it’s fun, and sometimes it’s perfectly awful, but it’s always good for you. People in large towns are like only-children.
”
”
Joyce Dennys (Henrietta Sees It Through: More News from the Home Front 1942-1945)
“
I also believe in cigarettes, cholesterol, alcohol, carbon monoxide, masturbation, the Arts Council, nuclear weapons, the Daily Telegraph, and not properly labeling fatal poisons, but above all else, most of all, I believe in the one thing that can come out of people's mouths: vomit.
”
”
Dennis Potter (The Singing Detective)
“
After the princess challenged the Field Marshall of all Tranta, Korban had to speak to her. "Princess, have you thought about this challenge? You could have benefitted from much more training and practice."
"I know that, Korban. I'm not stupid. This bloated man hasn't had a serious fight in...forever. I think I can win, even in my infant stage of martial skills.
”
”
Dennis K. Hausker (Primitives of Kar)
“
Wake up, buddy. You okay?” “Auntie Em! Auntie Em!” Homer’s VR came online, smiling. “I guess we got’em.” I snorted with relief. “And their little dog, too.” Homer steepled his fingers in a properly evil mastermindish pose. “All their base are belong to us.
”
”
Dennis E. Taylor (We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse, #1))
“
King Arthur: I am your king.
Peasant Woman: Well, I didn't vote for you.
King Arthur: You don't vote for kings.
Peasant Woman: Well, how'd you become king, then?
[Angelic music plays... ]
King Arthur: The Lady of the Lake, her arm clad in the purest shimmering samite, held aloft Excalibur from the bosom of the water, signifying by divine providence that I, Arthur, was to carry Excalibur. That is why I am your king.
Dennis the Peasant: Listen. Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
Arthur: Be quiet!
Dennis the Peasant: You can't expect to wield supreme power just 'cause some watery tart threw a sword at you!
”
”
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
“
Attitude Is Everything
We live in a culture that is blind to betrayal and intolerant of emotional pain. In New Age crowds here on the West Coast, where your attitude is considered the sole determinant of the impact an event has on you, it gets even worse.In these New Thought circles, no matter what happens to you, it is assumed that you have created your own reality. Not only have you chosen the event, no matter how horrible, for your personal growth. You also chose how you interpret what happened—as if there are no interpersonal facts, only interpretations.
The upshot of this perspective is that your suffering would vanish if only you adopted a more evolved perspective and stopped feeling aggrieved. I was often kindly reminded (and believed it myself), “there are no victims.” How can you be a victim when you are responsible for your circumstances?
When you most need validation and support to get through the worst pain of your life, to be confronted with the well-meaning, but quasi-religious fervor of these insidious half-truths can be deeply demoralizing. This kind of advice feeds guilt and shame, inhibits grieving, encourages grandiosity and can drive you to be alone to shield your vulnerability.
”
”
Sandra Lee Dennis
“
Because gratitude is the key to happiness, anything that undermines gratitude must undermine happiness. And nothing undermines gratitude as much as expectations. There is an inverse relationship between expectations and gratitude: The more expectations you have, the less gratitude you will have.
”
”
Dennis Prager
“
I know the truth, and I will tell you now: He was admired, loved, cheered, honored, respected. In life as well as in death. A great man, he is. A great man, he was. A great man he will be. He died that day because his body had served its purpose. His soul had done what it came to do, learned what it came to learn, and then was free to leave. And I knew, as Denny sped me toward the doctor who would fix me, that if I had already accomplished what I set out to accomplish here on earth, if I had already learned what I was meant to learn, I would have left the curb one second later than I had, and I would have been killed instantly by that car. But I was not killed. Because I was not finished. I still had work to do.
”
”
Garth Stein (The Art of Racing in the Rain)
“
My application's not bought,' I am telling them, calling into the darkness of the red cave that opens out before closed eyes. 'I am not just a boy who plays tennis. I have an intricate history. Experiences and feelings. I'm complex.
'I read,' I say. 'I study and read. I bet I've read everything you've read. Don't think I haven't. I consume libraries. I wear out spines and ROM-drives. I do things like get in a taxi and say, "The library, and step on it." My instincts concerning syntax and mechanics are better than your own, I can tell, with due respect. But it transcends the mechanics. I'm not a machine. I feel and believe. I have opinions. Some of them are interesting. I could, if you'd let me, talk and talk. Let's talk about anything. I believe the influence of Kierkegaard on Camus is underestimated. I believe Dennis Gabor may very well have been the Antichrist. I believe Hobbes is just Rousseau in a dark mirror. I believe, with Hegel, that transcendence is absorption. I could interface you guys right under the table,' I say. 'I'm not just a creatus, manufactured, conditioned, bred for a function.'
I open my eyes. 'Please don't think I don't care.
”
”
David Foster Wallace (Infinite Jest)
“
I recommend readers to be adventurous and to try things they’ve never heard of or considered reading before. Get out of the comfort zone and discover something new and exciting. If you’d never be caught dead in the mystery section go and read some George Pelecanos, Dennis Lehane, Michael Connelly or many others. If you only read thrillers get deep into the literary fiction aisle and let yourself be seduced. If you only read non-fiction pick up a Ian McDonald novel or a Joyce Carol Oates novel. If you only read comic books, get acquainted with the great Charles Dickens or a certain Monsieur Dumas. Pick up something at random and read a page. Feel the texture of the language, the architecture of the imagery, the perfume of the style… There’s so much beauty, intelligence and excitement to be had between the pages of the books waiting for you at your local bookstore the only thing you need to bring is an open mind and a sense of adventure. Disregard all prejudices, all pre-conceived notions and all the rubbish some people try to make you think. Think for yourself. Regarding books or anything in life. Think for yourself.
”
”
Carlos Ruiz Zafón
“
Lately, though, he'd just been tired in general. Tired of people. Tired of books and TV and the nightly news and songs on the radio he'd heard years before and hadn't liked much in the first place. He was tired of his clothes and tired of his hair and tired of other people's clothes and other people's hair. He was tired of wishing things made sense. He'd gotten to a point where he was pretty sure he'd heard everything anyone had to say on any given subject and so it seemed he spent his days listening to old recordings of things that hadn't seemed fresh the first time he'd heard them.
Maybe he was simply tired of life, of the absolute effort it took to get up every goddamned morning and walk out with into the same fucking day with only slight variations in the weather and food.
He wondered if this was what clinical depression felt like, a total numbness, a weary lack of hope.
”
”
Dennis Lehane (Mystic River)
“
I believe in God. Maybe not the Catholic God or even the Christian one because I have a hard time seeing any God as elitist. I also have a hard time believing that anything that created rain forests and oceans and an infinite universe would, in the same process, create something as unnatural as humanity in its own image. I believe in God, but not as a he or she or an it, but as something that defines my ability to conceptualize within the rather paltry frames of reference I have on hand.
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Dennis Lehane (A Drink Before the War (Kenzie & Gennaro, #1))
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Julia had a friend, a man named Dennys, who was as a boy a tremendously gifted artist. They had been friends since they were small, and she once showed me some of the drawings he made when he was ten or twelve: little sketches of birds pecking at the ground, of his face, round and blank, of his father, the local veterinarian, his hand smoothing the fur of a grimacing terrier. Dennys’s father didn’t see the point of drawing lessons, however, and so he was never formally schooled. But when they were older, and Julia went to university, Dennys went to art school to learn how to draw. For the first week, he said, they were allowed to draw whatever they wanted, and it was always Dennys’s sketches that the professor selected to pin up on the wall for praise and critique.
But then they were made to learn how to draw: to re-draw, in essence. Week two, they only drew ellipses. Wide ellipses, fat ellipses, skinny ellipses. Week three, they drew circles: three-dimensional circles, two-dimensional circles. Then it was a flower. Then a vase. Then a hand. Then a head. Then a body. And with each week of proper training, Dennys got worse and worse. By the time the term had ended, his pictures were never displayed on the wall. He had grown too self-conscious to draw. When he saw a dog now, its long fur whisking the ground beneath it, he saw not a dog but a circle on a box, and when he tried to draw it, he worried about proportion, not about recording its doggy-ness.
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Hanya Yanagihara (A Little Life)
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Got us a full moon too coming tomorrow night. Just make things a whole lot worse. All we need.
- Why is that?
- What’s that, Marshal?
- The full moon. You think it makes people crazy?
- I know it does.- Found a wrinkle in one of the pages and used his index finger to smooth it out.
- How come?
- Well, you think about it—the moon affects the tide, right?
- Sure.
- Has some sort of magnet effect or something on water.
- I’ll buy that.
- Human brain,- Trey said, - is over fifty percent water.
- No kidding?
- No kidding. You figure ol’ Mr. Moon can jerk the ocean around, think what it can do to the head.
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Dennis Lehane (Shutter Island)
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Blame is a Defense Against Powerlessness
Betrayal trauma changes you. You have endured a life-altering shock, and are likely living with PTSD symptoms— hypervigilance, flashbacks and bewilderment—with broken trust, with the inability to cope with many situations, and with the complete shut down of parts of your mind, including your ability to focus and regulate your emotions.
Nevertheless, if you are unable to recognize the higher purpose in your pain, to forgive and forget and move on, you clearly have chosen to be addicted to your pain and must enjoy playing the victim.
And the worst is, we are only too ready to agree with this assessment! Trauma victims commonly blame themselves. Blaming oneself for the shame of being a victim is recognized by trauma specialists as a defense against the extreme powerlessness we feel in the wake of a traumatic event. Self-blame continues the illusion of control shock destroys, but prevents us from the necessary working through of the traumatic feelings and memories to heal and recover.
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Sandra Lee Dennis
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This has been a novel about some people who were punished entirely too much for what they did. They wanted to have a good time, but they were like children playing in the street; they could see one after another of them being killed--run over, maimed, destroyed--but they continued to play anyhow. We really all were very happy for a while, sitting around not toiling but just bullshitting and playing, but it was for such a terrible brief time, and then the punishment was beyond belief: even when we could see it, we could not believe it. For example, while I was writing this I learned that the person on whom the character Jerry Fabin is based killed himself. My friend on whom I based the character Ernie Luckman died before I began the novel. For a while I myself was one of these children playing in the street; I was, like the rest of them, trying to play instead of being grown up, and I was punished. I am on the list below, which is a list of those to whom this novel is dedicated, and what became of each.
Drug misuse is not a disease, it is a decision, like the decision to step out in front of a moving car. You would call that not a disease but an error in judgment. When a bunch of people begin to do it, it is a social error,a life-style. In this particular life-style the motto is "Be happy now because tomorrow you are dying," but the dying begins almost at once, and the happiness is a memory. It is, then, only a speeding up, an intensifying, of the ordinary human existence. It is not different from your life-style, it is only faster. It all takes place in days or weeks or months instead of years. "Take the cash and let the credit go," as Villon said in 1460. But that is a mistake if the cash is a penny and the credit a whole lifetime.
There is no moral in this novel; it is not bourgeois; it does not say they were wrong to play when they should have toiled;it just tells what the consequences were. In Greek drama they were beginning, as a society, to discover science, which means causal law. Here in this novel there is Nemesis: not fate, because any one of us could have chosen to stop playing in the street, but, as I narrate from the deepest part of my life and heart, a dreadful Nemesis for those who kept on playing. I myself,I am not a character in this novel; I am the novel. So, though, was our entire nation at this time. This novel is about more people than I knew personally. Some we all read about in the newspapers. It was, this sitting around with our buddies and bullshitting while making tape recordings, the bad decision of the decade, the sixties, both in and out of the establishment. And nature cracked down on us. We were forced to stop by things dreadful.
If there was any "sin," it was that these people wanted to keep on having a good time forever, and were punished for that, but, as I say, I feel that, if so, the punishment was far too great, and I prefer to think of it only in a Greek or morally neutral way, as mere science, as deterministic impartial cause-and-effect. I loved them all. Here is the list, to whom I dedicate my love:
To Gaylene deceased
To Ray deceased
To Francy permanent psychosis
To Kathy permanent brain damage
To Jim deceased
To Val massive permanent brain damage
To Nancy permanent psychosis
To Joanne permanent brain damage
To Maren deceased
To Nick deceased
To Terry deceased
To Dennis deceased
To Phil permanent pancreatic damage
To Sue permanent vascular damage
To Jerri permanent psychosis and vascular damage
. . . and so forth.
In Memoriam.
These were comrades whom I had; there are no better. They remain in my mind, and the enemy will never be forgiven. The "enemy" was their mistake in playing. Let them all play again, in some other way, and let them be happy.
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Philip K. Dick (A Scanner Darkly)