Book Review
Saint Odd
by Dean Koontz
At the beginning of the year I reviewed a bunch of Odd Thomas books. I read a bunch of them back to back. It was kind of like binge watching your favorite show on Netflix. For TV, that can often be a lot of fun. Many shows now have clear story arcs that make binge watching more like reading a novel. There are lots of side distractions, but there is a main story for a season (nowadays, because people watch that way). A good example of this is Breaking Bad. It’s a single story, all the way through the season and even across seasons.
For serial dramas from before Netflix, that’s not always a good thing. That’s because you can see the formula. Take Law and Order. You’ve watched one, you’ve watched them all. But people like it, so they keep coming back in re-runs. But would you want to watch the whole season? I suspect not. It’s not a single story across the season. Rather, it is the same story again and again.
Reading Odd Thomas books are more like watching Law and Order than it is like watching Breaking Bad. In this case, I like the show, and this particular episode. I have the same problems I have always had. “Psychic magnetism” still feels like laziness. You can put the main character in the right place at the right time without having to go through the motions of figuring stuff out. The reader is on rails. There are no big surprises, no big reveals. If you like the rails you’re on then you will be happy. Koontz paints some good rails. And it was a good conclusion to the series.
B.S. Donovan 