Odd Thomas

So, I started reading a Dean Koontz series while I was away - Odd Thomas - super ironic, writing style in a sort of suspense, horror, sci-fi, mystery blend. The main character is Odd (his first name) Thomas and he sees ghosts. Elvis being his most regular visitor. Lots of fun with some very interesting comments on Christian faith along the way. How could I resist an opening like this:

MY NAME IS ODD THOMAS, though in this age when fame is the altar at which most people worship, I am not sure why you should care who I am or that I exist.

I am not a celebrity. I am not the child of a celebrity. I have never been married to, never been abused by, and never provided a kidney for transplantation into any celebrity. Furthermore, I have no desire to be a celebrity.

In fact I am such a nonentity by the standards of our culture that People magazine not only will never feature a piece about me but might also reject my attempts to subscribe to their publication on the grounds that the black-hole gravity of my noncelebrity is powerful enough to suck their entire enterprise into oblivion.

Koontz is an author my father-in-law intoduced me to. His Life Expectancy is a book I'd highly recommend with its relentless pace, twists and suspense. But really its the ironic writing style of Odd Thomas salted with truth that makes it for me:

You can con God and get away with it ... 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 don't mean to imply that I'm afraid of Death. I'm just not ready to go out on a date with him.

All I ask of Fate is that the people she hurls into my life, whether they are evil or good, or morally bipolar, should be amusing to one degree or another.... The problem is finding smile-inducing evil people, because the evil are the most humorless, though in the movies they frequently get some of the best lines.

You know what's wrong with humanity?... The greatest gift we were given is our free will, and we keep misusing it.

We can approach belief from an intellectual path, but in the end, God must be taken on faith. Proofs are for things of this world, things in time and of time, not beyond time.