Edward Fahey Quotes

Some guarded their children when they saw me, as though congenital defects and loneliness were contagious, even at a distance and through glass.

Sometimes I wish I could feel more pain
so I could touch that much more beauty.

I keep being told that my writing is getting better and better. - Now, at first I am thrilled by that, but then I think, Isn't everybody's? Do some authors grow cozy with their own style, and stay there?
I think of writing fiction as an art form. As such, it's a constant exploration of new and developing ideas. If any of my books were much like my others, I don't think I'd even bother to write them.

In pain and loss, we can find either meaning, or hopelessness. The choice is ours.
How we see things, how we interpret them, how we emotionally react;
these call more of the same into our lives.
We build a world for ourselves out of what we believe.
And how we choose to respond.
Whether we let it take us under,
or rise to meet it.
- From "The Soul Hides in Shadows", a novel by Edward Fahey

It was a dense, moldering night, smelling of damp old basements and times best left unstirred.

Broken hearts show us we've grown out of one stage, by ripping us wide open for the next.
We're forced to choose what we do with all that pain: turn it against ourselves, aim it at someone else, or tap all that power and reach higher.

I'd gone out into the world, intricately lacing distractions and busywork around the long-gnawing emptiness, only to find I'd merely embellished rather than hidden it.

Sometimes everything inside us must be torn apart. Only then can we sort through to what is truly worth keeping.

I miss you so much in these wee morning hours,
when the depth of the night sets my spirit free.
When the forest is dark, and there doesn't have to be anything in the world
but the beauty I pull out of it.
I miss you throughout the day,
as I come across glories and wonders that could easily overwhelm me,
but just dull because you're not here to enjoy them.

The emptiness of one's days
can be seen as utterly hopeless
or as ripe with potential.

As so often happens in my strange writing process, after weeks of distraction; of not thinking about the book at all; yesterday I started writing before the sun was up, or coffee was made. Whipped out a whole chapter of probably six or seven separate scenes in less than two hours. Now today, the whole story has slipped into a deeper level of knowing and connections than has (as far as I know, anyway) ever really been written about before. This is much as my experience was with Ailana, when I kept slipping into deeper and deeper gears. Bringing forth insights I myself had never learned or suspected.

The diaphanous gown of the Milky Way shifted through scattered stars and all wishes made upon them. It gathered its silky folds as her eyes adjusted to darkness through spasms of beauty and joy.
Florescent mists wandered the shadows, brushing trees softly with moon glow.

Ancient philosophers and spiritual teachers were explorers. They wanted us to be as well. They thought we should understand this physical world, but not get stuck here. For thousands of years we have shared their insights, over-analyzed and repeated their words; quoting and re-translating until all meaning has been lost. These great minds, great souls, great beings sought to be jumping off points, not merely the originators of emptied out and desiccated clichés. They wanted to be doorways, not doorstops.

Racism has taken over America; discrimination and misogyny are the law. The clash between our better and darker instincts slams home.
It is the year 2037. What is now referred to as "The Great Madness of '16" has set loose moral, economic, and cultural devastation. In the once powerful United States, paranoia and hatred rage at epidemic levels.
Behind "The Great Barrier Walls", Red State citizens suffer near-slavery and dire hunger at the hands of totalitarian leaders calling themselves the PolitiChurch. Family Values Patrols work the streets, raping, maiming, and murdering in the name of Righteousness. Children are corralled and forced to work for the state.
The world is tearing itself apart. Between those who choose to hate, in an us-against-them world; and those who find healing through helping those in need.
Oppressive governments and bullying leaders crush their followers into mindless subservience, herding them like cattle, whipping up fear and hatred against outsiders.
As one side surges into ever more disturbing and twisted violence, some counterforce leading toward caring and truth seems to be awakening in others.
In this war there can be no compromise.
Had ancients predicted these times? Must mankind destroy itself? Is there no hope?
Or is there something we're not seeing?
- Back cover description of "The Soul Hides in Shadows

Grief is a closing that leads to an opening just exactly when you really don't want one.

Life is about trying to find our ways back to our one shared soul. When we're looking out at the stars, we're looking into ourselves.

Something had gone horribly wrong at my birth, so my father would never have his little soldier, Mom would never have her home filled with tiny scampering joy, and we each clutched our guilt very privately.

It is so hard to think 'was' about your mom.

You have become what you are through countless lives and lessons. There is something you can offer others; if only working on your self-discipline, fighting your own baser urges.
Do that then. Do what is offered. Learn and grow as you can.
That in itself is service.

Darkness crept through. Shadows pried at doors, teased dull edges of recollections that never quite took hold. Memories that would have shriveled under the blinding sun of daylight. And reason.

Let go of the past.
Open to forever.
Hearts can heal.
Inside them is that which can never be broken.

Forgiveness doesn't make one person better, or the other guy smaller. Forgiving is just letting go. It's turning back toward being what we really are.