Darcy Coates > Quotes

“C'mon. We can turn it into a fun game - What's Scarier, The Basement Or The Attic?”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Blackwood House

“The massive grey tabby turned his sea-green eyes towards her and projected abject misery in the way only cats are capable of.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Ashburn House

“This is a house that hasn’t seen a new soul in half a century. The walls are saturated with her; the floorboards are worn down from her feet; the very air continues to carry her presence after her death.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Ashburn House

“You may rule the world by day, but the creatures of the night demand their privacy.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Gillespie House

“There are three parts to a person: a body, a spirit, and a soul. When the body dies, the soul goes into whatever is waiting for us after death. But the spirit can sometimes get stuck behind. That’s what a ghost is: a spirit anchored to earth by residual energy. The soul, the part that goes to the afterlife, is our core person—the identity we were born with. The spirit is our emotions, our temperament, our intelligence—the parts of us that are created and changed by our time on earth. So, when a ghost is formed, it’s missing both the soul and the body that it needs to be a full human. It’s like an echo of what it once was.”
― Darcy Coates, The Carrow Haunt

“She’d said that life had sections, like walking through doors. People had to choose when to walk through them, but no one could see what the next room held until they were in it. Some new rooms were painful. Some were happy. Some seemingly had no purpose. But the fullest, happiest lives were lived by those who walked through many different doors, unafraid of what they would find.”
― Darcy Coates, Hunted

“But what does it matter if I forget a story after a month as long as I enjoy it while I’m reading it?”
― Darcy Coates, The Folcroft Ghosts

“Mistakes make us human; don’t torture yourself over a choice you made four years ago. If you think you were wrong, make a plan to change what you can. Action is good. Choices are good. But guilt on its own never fixed anyone’s problem.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Blackwood House

“The human mind couldn't cope with looking at nothing for very long and, in sufficient darkness, quickly began to create its own images of what it thought belonged there.”
― Darcy Coates, From Below

“Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”
― Darcy Coates, Hunted

“Shoot for the moon. If you miss, you’ll die horribly in the void of space.”
― Darcy Coates, Craven Manor

“They weren’t all that different from her—teenagers who had found themselves classified as adults by virtue of too many birthdays and who were trying to fumble and bluff their way through the world without anyone realising how thoroughly underqualified they were.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Ashburn House

“I wish I’d never started, but I cannot stop. Death is the next step. Heaven owes me no mercy, so I will make my own.”
― Darcy Coates, The Carrow Haunt

“I’m going to be single my whole life. I’ll have twelve cats and live in a haunted house and be the happiest spinster you’ve ever met.”
― Darcy Coates, The Carrow Haunt

“It turned out a person could make the correct choice, and still feel strangled by regret.”
― Darcy Coates, Where He Can't Find You

“Then she looked at her phone and saw, to her horror, she hadn’t been hung up on after all. Her battery had died.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Blackwood House

“A thousand paper cuts given over a lifetime might be insignificant, but when none of them are allowed to heal, they fester into something awful.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Leigh Harker

“Hope cannot be relied on. But sometimes we still need it to survive.”
― Darcy Coates, Dead of Winter

“The house, despite being caked in opulence, felt hostile, as though she were unworthy of staying in it. As if it barely tolerated her. The judgement seeped out of the walls and rose through the floorboards. It bled resentment.”
― Darcy Coates, Voices in the Snow

“how much attention did you pay to your sunrise this morning? Did you make the most of it, as though it could be your last?”
― Darcy Coates, From Below

“It will be fine. Go and season the door, just like regular people do all the time.”
― Darcy Coates, Craven Manor

“Regret will drag you down, smother you, kill you. You’ve got to face forward. Try your hardest. Do what you can to improve the world while you have the chance.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Rookward House

“She hated being a burden. He never said or did anything to make her feel like one, but she knew what she was.”
― Darcy Coates, Voices in the Snow

“Rules: No strangers are allowed onto the property. Do not enter the tower. Do not leave the groundskeeper’s cottage between midnight and dawn. Draw your curtains. Keep the door locked. If you hear knocking, do not answer it.”
― Darcy Coates, Craven Manor

“Sometimes the worst things that happen to you come from the smallest decisions.”
― Darcy Coates, Where He Can't Find You

“Do not mistake hardheartedness for strength. To live in this world and to hold on to your humanity, your compassion, your joy—I believe that is strength. And more valuable than being callous enough that death never haunts you.”
― Darcy Coates, Secrets in the Dark

“Beneath that was another darker fear. That maybe she didn’t want to see clearly. That maybe there was something about the hallway that was hiding just outside of their lights, and she was better off not knowing it was there.”
― Darcy Coates, From Below

“he’d felt desperate, always clawing for just enough money to pay rent and eat, running the endless treadmill of job applications and rejections, and feeling that homelessness was always just a misstep away.”
― Darcy Coates, Craven Manor

“She blinked, trying to recall the dream, but the effort was like trying to chase water while it soaked into the ground.”
― Darcy Coates, The Haunting of Ashburn House

“Not for the first time, Tara wished she could read in the car without becoming sick.”
― Darcy Coates, The Folcroft Ghosts