Reading a Dean Koontz Novel from His Odd Thomas Series – I Had to Know How Koontz Did This – How Could a Protagonist in a Suspense Thriller Become the Subject of a Series – I Found Out –

My relaxation station is a love-seat with a bench that I use as a coffee table and footstool. Picture that. It works. I rest my feet on the bench and read books on my Kindle.

This afternoon I read a Dean Koontz novel, one from his Odd Thomas series.

Wikipedia says of this writer, Dean Ray Koontz (born July 9, 1945) is an American author. His novels are broadly described as suspense thrillers, but also frequently incorporate elements of horror, science fiction, mystery, and satire. Several of his books have appeared on the New York Times Bestseller List, with 14 hardcovers and 14 paperbacks reaching the number one position.

My daughter once told me how much she liked Dean Koontz’s novels. She tried to describe what one of them was about. I told her she shouldn’t read books in that genre. (I thought it wasn’t good for her. She was already an adult, but that doesn’t stop a mom from giving directions, does it?) She politely ignored my instruction.

One day I went with her to her her doctor’s office. While she was in the office, I was sitting in the waiting room with nothing to do. I saw her Dean Koontz novel, so I thought I’d take a look to see how bad it was. Oh, it was bad. Scary, anyway. But it wasn’t what I expected. I couldn’t put it down. When she returned to the waiting room, I had read several chapters of the book and had to get a copy of my own to read the rest.

I haven’t read a Dean Koontz book for a long while until recently. While browsing on Amazon, I noticed that he had written a series. I had to know how he could write a bunch of books based on a protagonist that probably was mentally off balance or in some way weird? This had to be a role reversal somehow. How could the bad guy be the good guy? I bought an Odd Thomas novel and read it.

The main character in this series is Odd Thomas, who is good in a strange way. He is the prevailing hero against all odds. Oddie (his nick name) is an ordinary guy, a fry cook with an unusual and mysterious call on his life. I cannot begin to explain how I could keep reading page after page and be thoroughly entertained by Oddie. I am. I continue to admire this author’s style of writing.