An Odd Encounter,
Dean Koontz was definitely firing on all cylinders when he wrote Odd Thomas. Stepping outside his usual multiple viewpoint, third person style, Koontz keeps this first person narrative lively by allowing the story to unfold through the eyes of the quirky but likeable character of Odd Thomas. In the beginning, I thought Koontz's actually naming the character "Odd" Odd Thomasa bit much, but as the plot pulled me in that didn't seem to matter. If you're a Koontz fan, you'll love this one. ( )

I'm new to Dean Koontz, and this is the first novel of his that I have read. I don't know about the quality of his other books, but this one did not disappoint by any stretch of the imagination.

It tells the story of a man named Odd Thomas who can see the dead. This is told from the first-person narrative of Odd Thomas himself, and this is excellent because Odd is a very likeable, funny character. The way Koontz narrates things from Odd's point of view allows a good deal of witty and amusing dialogue.

That said, before I opened this book and began to read it, there was the thought lingering in the back of my mind that this was going to be an unoriginal copy of M. Night Shyamalan's film The Sixth Sense, as it uses the same concept.

I was wrong.

Yes, it does use the same concept as Sixth Sense, but it takes the seed that Shyamalan planted, and makes an entirely different tree, to use an analogy. The dead that Odd sees can't talk. So naturally, communicating with them causes some difficulties for Odd throughout the novel. And hey, you didn't see the ghost of Elvis Presley in Sixth Sense, did you?

All-in-all, this book is not perfect. I'm not a big fan of Koontz's overall writing style and I much prefer Stephen King, but that tiny flaw should not stop you from reading this. It's a fun, good-paced, and entertaining novel that everyone can enjoy, no matter their age or tastes. ( )

Odd Thomas sees dead people and has strange psychic abilities. He might be odd but apparantly his girlfriend, Stormy, is gorgeous. His home town is inundated with evil shadows (bodocks) which spike his weird meter and sets Odd on a mission to find out what is going on. This is typical Dean Koontz - way out there but enjoyable nonetheless. I usually like Koontz's writing and this was no exception. Odd is a quirky guy but also loveable, caring and kind. There is a few murders in it but no really graphic details. Even the squeamish should be able to read this one. The ending is very sad and unexpected. Looking forward to the next book in the series. ( )

Odd Thomas was pretty aptly named. From his tragic and disconcerting childhood until his unique ability to see and touch ghosts, his life had always been odd. For months Odd had been having dreams of a bloody, terrifying event and now with the appearance of Fungus Man in his small town of Pico Mundo Odd knows the time has come and nothing will ever be the same again.

Part suspense/thriller, part horror, for me this book didn't settle comfortably into either category. Generally I appreciate ambiguity but it does make it hard to know what you're getting into. I did like the premise of a man being able to see and commune, if not necessarily communicate in so many words, with the ghosts around him. There were, however, a few drawbacks about the story I wasn't comfortable with. I'm not a huge fan of foreshadowing, of which there is quite a bit. There is also the matter of digression where you're moving along with the plot only to have Odd segue into past remembrances or boughts of trivia which, for me, took away from the pace of the book. I don't mind it to some extent, but these trips weren't just little offshoots, and would occasionally fill a few pages. The other issue is that everything here is black and white. Odd is a good guy, his many and varied friends are good guys. Everyone else is insane or evil, there really weren't many shades of gray. I sometimes felt Odd's voice and point of view was a little too preachy for my taste.

I do think that this book was well written and it was interesting so that I didn't feel inclined to skip anything, not even the offshoots from the plot. Insofar as ghost stories go, I would recommend this to fans of the genre. Personally, I do have another Koontz story in mind that I would like to read although I don't think I'll continue on with Odd's particular series. ( )

For approximately the first 140 pages of this book, I was beginning to wonder what all of the hubbub was about. Everyone seems to love this book and the entire Odd Series; it is the main reason I picked it up and read it. Now I am not saying that the story wasn’t mildly entertaining in the first half of the book, but it was just okay. It was about page 150 that I really became drawn into the story and really started relating to the characters.

Koontz is a master story teller and I am happy to report (after finishing the book) that he did not let us down with this book. This book has been reviewed on so many levels that I can’t add any worthwhile sentiments that haven’t already been expressed. All I can say is, if you haven’t read it ….. What are you waiting for? ( )