Dean Koontz

shelleyo

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I bought it back when anything that had his name on it was an autobuy. I go back to reread SHADOWS and PHANTOMS and DRAGON TEARS now and then, but... meh. Nothing new since that book.

I'm not sure if it's because you think that's the road he started going down, or if the topic just makes you squick now everytime you think of him. Demon Seed was one of his earliest works that was re-released with a new cover and everything a long, long time ago, which explains a lot. It was nowhere near the quality of something like Phantoms (my favorite of his), Midnight, Watchers, Lightning, or even some of his other early stuff like Servants of Twilight. If it's just the squick-factor that put you off, yeah, when he wrote it really doesn't matter.

I was a die-hard fan from the day I read Darkfall and couldn't get enough. I read his back catalogue as fast as I could find them at the used bookstore or library, and then pined for every new release. The last books I read were From the Corner of His Eye, in hardcover. I didn't much care for that one, but I can handle an occasional disappointment. It's that each one was a little less satisfying.

The one that did me in, I think , was Moonlight, which had some nice parts but had a child character that I could not believe in at all (if that's the right book). I found myself in disbelief through much of it. I know characters can't be ordinary, but this one was just too far out for me.

Shelley
 
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Jess Haines

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I hadn't realized it was earlier work. At the time it looked like a new release.

Content/subject matter squicked me. Bought it one day while I was browsing the bookstore. Never looked back.

I do have to say, though, there was a point where a lot of his books felt like reading the same story over and over again for me. That was just the final straw. Not to say I don't appreciate ANY of his work, DEMON SEED was just the end for me.

Might go back to retry newer Koontz stuff at some point, but my TBR pile is already at the point where it's about to swallow me whole, so I don't see it being anytime soon.
 

shelleyo

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Demon Seed was his first "hit," I think. It was turned into a movie I remember seeing when I was probably too young to have seen it. I think he wrote it in the early 70s and the movie was made a few years later. I didn't see it until the early 80s, when I was a young teen and it was on TV.

Apparently, the re-released version in the 1990s was rewritten almost completely (I didn't realize that at the time) and actually toned down the squicky sexual stuff. Wow?

I agree about reading the same book over and over. His latest Amazon reviews tell the tale, I think. Seems most aren't that excited about his stuff anymore. Such a shame, because when he was in his heyday, he was my favorite.

Shelley
 

Jess Haines

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Really? I had no idea there were movies involved, too. Huh.

I read the whole thing mostly out of morbid curiosity. I have a tendency to pick up WTFery and finish it rather than put it down because it puts me off. Don't ask me why. Doing the same thing with this one book right now (ADORA), which is the most rapetastic piece of literature I have ever put my hands on.

I do like Koontz's style. I would like to pick up more of his work some day, but when I have more time and after I have chipped away at the stuff in my own genre that I've been dying to get to.
 

brainstorm77

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It was decent, but a little to far-fetched for my taste. He had me for the first half of it, but the ending was if-y, for a lack of a better word.

Yeah, I agree. I didn't like the ending.
 

fireluxlou

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I read Hideaway and have the film of it.

I was obsessed with it and the book. Would repeatedly watch it over and over. I always thought his writing was trying to be like Stephen King's though.
 

Satori1977

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I love his style of writing, just think his books are getting too predictable. I have only read the first two Odd books, should read the rest. And his early ones, especially Watchers, I can read over and over again. Wish they would make a movie out of it that stays true to the story.

I really don't see his writing style to be at all like King's. I will never get why they get compared.
 

Satori1977

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Just read What the Night Knows, his newest (I think). And it was excellent. His best book in years, IMO. Reminded me of his earlier books, that same style. I really hope this means he is getting back to his roots and writing great books again.
 
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Don't think that's out here yet. Will have to keep an eye out for it. What's it about, Satori?

And more importantly - is there a psychic dog in this book? :D
 

Satori1977

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This is from Goodreads:

In the late summer of a long ago year, a killer arrived in a small city. His name was Alton Turner Blackwood, and in the space of a few months he brutally murdered four families. His savage spree ended only when he himself was killed by the last survivor of the last family, a fourteen-year-old boy.

Half a continent away and two decades later, someone is murdering families again, recreating in detail Blackwood’s crimes. Homicide detective John Calvino is certain that his own family—his wife and three children—will be targets in the fourth crime, just as his parents and sisters were victims on that distant night when he was fourteen and killed their slayer.

As a detective, John is a man of reason who deals in cold facts. But an extraordinary experience convinces him that sometimes death is not a one-way journey, that sometimes the dead return.

Here is ghost story like no other you have read. In the Calvinos, Dean Koontz brings to life a family that might be your own, in a war for their survival against an adversary more malevolent than any he has yet created, with their own home the battleground. Of all his acclaimed novels, none exceeds What the Night Knows in power, in chilling suspense, and in sheer mesmerizing storytelling


Yes, there is a dog, kind of. The family had a dog that had died, and is brought up a little bit. Also, the kids are a little precocious (as usual in his books). But I could overlook all that because the story was that good. It was hard to put down. And I love a good ghost story. But it was unlike any ghost story I have read.
 
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I have about four unread Koontzes in my house, but if you say this new one reads like a return to form for him, I'll probably be tempted to buy rather than library-borrow.
 

Satori1977

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I used to buy his books outright, and most of the ones I own I have reread many times. Watchers is by far my favorite. But the last couple I had bought just didn't feel the same, so I stopped buying them. Picked this one up at the library on a whim, and seriously couldn't put it down. I will probably buy it myself. No one was more disappointed in where his books were going than me, he was always one of my favorite writers. I am now excited to read his books again.

Oh, a little off topic, but last weekend he did a rare interview for a Sunday morning show. The showed his personal library in his house, and I was so jealous. It was beautiful!
 

NicoleB

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I just read What the Night Knows and I am very impressed. It's reminiscent of what he used to right. Thank god.
 

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Baam!--thread necromancy :D
If we divide the 'horror' genre into three subcategories: sci-fi, psycho, and supernatural, it will turn out many people prefer a specific subcategory. I myself am in the B sci-fi flick camp, and very much like the contributions of Mr. Koontz in this subgenre. Night Chills, The Bad Place, Winter Moon--terrific stuff. His prose does not have the spontaneous grace Mr. King's used to have in his high-flying days, but it certainly has it's turbo-pulp dense baroque charm. I am a great fan of his books and read them both for kicks and for study.
 
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