DEAN KOONTZ 2-BOOK THRILLER COLLECTION: Innocence, The City
DEAN KOONTZ
HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2015
Copyright © Dean Koontz 2015
Dean Koontz asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This is entirely a work of fiction. Any references to real people, living or dead, real events, businesses, organizations and localities are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. All names, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Ebook Edition © MAY 2015 ISBN: 9780008108670
Version: 2015-04-17
Contents
INNOCENCE
DEAN KOONTZ
Harper
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2013
First published in the USA in 2013 by Bantam Books,
an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group,
A division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Copyright © Dean Koontz 2013
Cover design layout © HarperCollinsPublishers 2014
Cover photographs © Keith Morris/Alamy (figure); MBI/Alamy (back pack); Nikki Smith/Arcangel Images (sky); Shutterstock.com (buildings).
Dean Koontz asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780007518043
Ebook Edition © DECEMBER 2013 ISBN: 9780007518036
Version: 2015-04-17
This book is dedicated to Harry Recard for being a friend, for teaching me pinochle in college and thereby nearly ruining my academic career. And to Diane Recard for taking such good care of Harry all these years, an exhausting task.
* * *
Nothing pleases a writer more than mail from readers who claim that one of his books was life-changing or inspired perseverance in difficult times. But as I finished Innocence, a letter that I received from Elizabeth Waters in the state of Washington, regarding my novel From the Corner of His Eye, moved me more profoundly than most. Beth, your courage humbles me. The hope that you found in my book is matched by the hope that you have given me with your kind correspondence. You shine.
Rarely do great beauty and great virtue dwell together.
— PETRARCH, De Remediis
Contents
Part One: The Girl I Met in Lamplight Near Charles Dickens