- Written by Stephen King
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEsRSQcy_Q0
- Buy it: Amazon Link
Spoiler-free Synopsis
Holly Gibney is a private investigator, first introduced in 2014’s “Mr. Mercedes.” In this book, she starts investigating a missing young woman who had no real reason to go missing, according to her mother. As Holly digs into the case more deeply, complicated due to being set in the worst part of the COVID pandemic, she learns that the recent missing person may only be the tip of the iceberg. Could there be an actual serial killer on the loose that the police didn’t even notice?
It could actually be worse than that…
Commentary
To be completely honest, I haven’t read a King novel since “Under the Dome.” I was in no way familiar with Holly Gibney, Mr. Mercedes, or any of that. Even so, the book was easy to follow, and any references to past cases and activities were quite clear to me. You do NOT need to read the previous books in the series to get everything you need from this.
It’s more of a mystery novel than a horror story, with the mystery turned inside out. We know who is doing it early on and gradually learn why. But Holly doesn’t know what we do, and we root for her as she pieces things together. The serial killer’s actions and methods definitely lean more toward the horrific, so be warned.
There have been some people who complain that the book is too political. It clearly doesn’t shy away from bringing in COVID, Trump, and anti-vaxxers into the story, but those things all really happened, and they are relevant to the plot, so I see no issue with it. I think setting the story in the middle of COVID was actually a really interesting thing to do, and it added a lot to the book.
I absolutely enjoyed the novel and recommend it to mystery fans and fans of Stephen King as a storyteller. For horror fans, it may be a little light, but it’s still very good!