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Odd Thomas journeys through California and Nevada after a vision about the murders of three children, an effort throughout which he befriends a series of eccentric helpers who become allies in a battle against a sociopath and a network of killers.Tags
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This review is written with a GPL 3.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at Bookstooge.booklikes.blogspot. wordpress.leafmarks.com & Bookstooge's Reviews on the Road Facebook Group by Bookstooge's Exalted Permission. Title: Deeply Odd Series: Odd Thomas Author: Dean Koontz Rating: 3 of 5 Stars Genre: Urban Fantasy Pages: 352 Format: Kindle Synopsis: Odd has a vision of a mysterious cowboy burning 3 children alive. To prevent that is the adventure that this book portrays. Odd meets a variety of people, some really good, some really bad. He also realizes that the supernatural world that show more he has a limited access to is much wider and has a greater impact on our world than he previously realized. My Thoughts: Odd Thomas takes on a Satanic Cult. I haven't added the horror tag onto this series until now. But this one certainly deserves it. Koontz takes a very broad based Judeo-Christian world view and throws the demons full on onto Odd. Thankfully, unlike Stephen King, Koontz also emphasizes the side of Good, no matter how peculiar they might be. It is made abundantly clear that Odd couldn't have taken on this adventure, and succeeded, without the help of many other Good people. I like that. Several things made me uncomfortable with this read though. I suspect it was Koontz's intent, but I still want to note them. The children. Anytime a story revolves around the pain, suffering and possible death of children, it puts me on edge. I do not subscribe to the belief that children are "innocents". I was a child, once. I remember. I have also seen children through my adult eyes. Anyone who thinks children are innocent has never seen two 5 year olds fight over a toy and then lie like a politician about it when one of them gets hurt and the adults have to intervene. But I am a strong believer that children must be protected until such a time as they can take care of themselves, mentally, physically and emotionally. So it just makes it a hard read when children are the object of a satanic ritual. Which brings me to the second thing that made me uncomfortable. The satanism and demons. I am a Christian and hence believe that the supernatural world is real. I believe in God. I believe that Satan is a fallen angel and that demons are other fallen angels. I believe that the devil hates God and His creation so much that he'd rather see it destroyed than exist and not be under his, Satan's, control. I believe that the devil is immensely powerful and can give some of that power to humans to further his own aims. So to just casually write about this subject sets off alarm bells in my head. Like I said above though, I think Koontz included both those subjects as uncomfortable subjects and not just because it was convenient for the plot. Or maybe it was. Either way, while they made me uncomfortable, I liked the way Koontz handled them. There is one more book in this series, Saint Odd. While I'm sad that this series will end, as I'm enjoying the whole of it so far, I am glad that Koontz will finish this. A good story needs an ending and a good author will not allow said story to be the story that never ends and to have it wither on the vine, so to speak. " show less
This was not to the level of the previous Odd Thomas books. It took me way too long to finish this book because it was incredibly boring for at least half of the book. Odd Thomas is supposed to be a different sort of character and a deep thinking and feeling character but the amount of "deep thought" jibber jabber in this book was over the top. I ended up skipping over multiple pages at a time (multiple times!) and don't feel I missed anything thing at all. The only good thing about this book was the last 40 pages or so.
I think this series has seen better days and probably should come to an end very soon!
I think this series has seen better days and probably should come to an end very soon!
I love Odd and enjoyed most of the story. Edie Fisher is a hoot and hope to see more of her and the other characters introduced in Deeply Odd. Odd's rambling always polite conversations and his unfailing optimist observations have been the highlight of previous Odd Thomas books but this time I felt Koontz became too disillusioned with the political system and society and I lost Odd's characteristic sense of hope. Hopefully Koontz will be able to renew Odd's outlook before the next book.
"Odd Thomas" is here using his psychic magnetism to track down the "Rhinestone Cowboy Trucker" who has powers of his own. That was a nice twist, as we saw that Odd wasn't the only person in the world with a touch of the supernatural on their lives. Unfortunately, the things that made the first book so interesting have slowly begun to fade away in the last two or three novels in the series. I am all for character growth, but it seems as if Dean has almost lost his original idea of what made Odd so special and has been moving him into a new character. The thing I miss most in the "Odd" stories is the loss of the spirits of the lingering dead he used to encounter and often help. Even his ghost dog is no longer hanging out with him.
I have show more read this series from the start and will admit that I was less than enthused with the last couple of books. Maybe it's time for Koontz to end this series and go back to writing the great stand alone books he was so loved for by his fans. show less
I have show more read this series from the start and will admit that I was less than enthused with the last couple of books. Maybe it's time for Koontz to end this series and go back to writing the great stand alone books he was so loved for by his fans. show less
Deeply Odd is a hard book to review. For the first time in this series, you must have read all previous volumes of Odd's adventures to receive the grand picture. Throughout Deeply Odd, our fry-cook-turned-reluctant-hero hearkens back to every other novel (aside from Forever Odd, of course, as I believe even Koontz knows that book is only worth forgetting). This is important to the average reader because if you have not read the other books, you will be bored beyond all hope.
Odd rambles and rambles, going over previous outings and world views, with his unique wit and sarcasm. Unfortunately, here in the seventh Odd Thomas novel, he's starting to wear on my nerves. It's come to a point where I just want him to shut up and get on with the show more story.
The story is the only reason this book garnered even the two stars I gave it. Like the second in the series, Forever Odd, Deeply Odd drags on, ad nauseum, with descriptions of litter and plant life that do absolutely nothing to progress the story further, but seem to act as nothing more than filler to expand the word count so that his publisher can sell an outrageously priced ebook. As I said in my review of Gaiman's The Ocean At The End of the Lane, I don't mind paying fifteen bucks for an electronic file... if the story's worth it. But when it takes until the 84% mark for your book to get even remotely interesting, I require a drastic cut in price. The problem, and the truth of the matter, is this. I'm going to buy the next one, and the next one after that, and so on, because I love Odd Thomas. And the publisher, along with Koontz himself, knows this.
The story inside the pages of Deeply Odd is an afterthought to Odd's mental meanderings. Every scene of action (what few there are in the first 84% of the book) only serve to give odd a speaking platform on which he riffs about Mommy Porn, consumerism, "The Real Housewives of Wherever" (that's an actual quote from the book), and the over all shitty nature of our hairless ape society. It's book seven, Dean, I think we understand... the world's gone to pot, and the bad people far out number the good, but Odd must continue to tell us he sees some thread of hope, all while speaking of himself in an unkind manner. We get it! He doesn't think he's a hero. No real hero does, and all that. Blah blah blah...
There is nothing new here. In fact, everything in this book has been done in the past six volumes. You have the hunts through garages and stairwells. Check. A climactic conclusion involving Odd and numerous baddies, all occurring in a huge, sprawling mansion (circa Odd Apocalypse). Check. The search of an long abandoned location (Odd Thomas and Forever Odd). Storm Drains of Doom (Odd Hours and Odd Interlude). Some enigmatic old woman who just so happens to have a disposable handgun tucked away in her purse (no shit, didn't this same exact scene happen in Odd Hours?). The list goes on and on.
I'd say avoid this book like the plague, but if you like Odd Thomas (as I do) you'll read it, and, by the end, you might even like it. I just can't ignore all the stuff I mentioned simply because I find Odd Thomas one of the coolest, most endearing characters of my lifetime.
It's about quality, Mr. Koontz, not quantity. Slow down and give us stories worth our time and money.
E. show less
Odd rambles and rambles, going over previous outings and world views, with his unique wit and sarcasm. Unfortunately, here in the seventh Odd Thomas novel, he's starting to wear on my nerves. It's come to a point where I just want him to shut up and get on with the show more story.
The story is the only reason this book garnered even the two stars I gave it. Like the second in the series, Forever Odd, Deeply Odd drags on, ad nauseum, with descriptions of litter and plant life that do absolutely nothing to progress the story further, but seem to act as nothing more than filler to expand the word count so that his publisher can sell an outrageously priced ebook. As I said in my review of Gaiman's The Ocean At The End of the Lane, I don't mind paying fifteen bucks for an electronic file... if the story's worth it. But when it takes until the 84% mark for your book to get even remotely interesting, I require a drastic cut in price. The problem, and the truth of the matter, is this. I'm going to buy the next one, and the next one after that, and so on, because I love Odd Thomas. And the publisher, along with Koontz himself, knows this.
The story inside the pages of Deeply Odd is an afterthought to Odd's mental meanderings. Every scene of action (what few there are in the first 84% of the book) only serve to give odd a speaking platform on which he riffs about Mommy Porn, consumerism, "The Real Housewives of Wherever" (that's an actual quote from the book), and the over all shitty nature of our hairless ape society. It's book seven, Dean, I think we understand... the world's gone to pot, and the bad people far out number the good, but Odd must continue to tell us he sees some thread of hope, all while speaking of himself in an unkind manner. We get it! He doesn't think he's a hero. No real hero does, and all that. Blah blah blah...
There is nothing new here. In fact, everything in this book has been done in the past six volumes. You have the hunts through garages and stairwells. Check. A climactic conclusion involving Odd and numerous baddies, all occurring in a huge, sprawling mansion (circa Odd Apocalypse). Check. The search of an long abandoned location (Odd Thomas and Forever Odd). Storm Drains of Doom (Odd Hours and Odd Interlude). Some enigmatic old woman who just so happens to have a disposable handgun tucked away in her purse (no shit, didn't this same exact scene happen in Odd Hours?). The list goes on and on.
I'd say avoid this book like the plague, but if you like Odd Thomas (as I do) you'll read it, and, by the end, you might even like it. I just can't ignore all the stuff I mentioned simply because I find Odd Thomas one of the coolest, most endearing characters of my lifetime.
It's about quality, Mr. Koontz, not quantity. Slow down and give us stories worth our time and money.
E. show less
Sometimes Dean Koontz has a little trouble getting out of his own way as a writer and such is the case with this installment in the Odd Thomas series. Oddie has always been a mouthpiece for Koontz's own opinions, and this didn't bother me as long as it was secondary to the story. A stray comment here and there, a bit of conversation with another character, and so on--it was there, but it was part of our quirky, thoughtful Oddie--and it integrated well with what was happening in the storyline.
Not so this time around. Entire pages were dedicated to Koontz "holding forth" on the government and the state of the world by way of Oddie and other characters--pages that contributed nothing to the plot, nothing to character development, and only show more served as an impetus to skim the text and skip forward. I go to church on Sunday for sermons, I read my Bible when I want to understand universal truths, I pray when I want to talk to God, and I read the news when I need to know that our government is up to no good. But I read the Odd Thomas series because it's funny and profound and because--when he's doing his job--Koontz is the master of the well-turned phrase and he knows how to deliver the rising action.
The ending is the only thing that saved this story from failing completely and I almost didn't bother to finish it. This is why it's got three stars instead of one. If the rest of the story had delivered the way the ending did, I'd have no complaints.
I am questioning whether or not I will bother with the last book in the series. I know I won't recommend this one. Maybe Odd Thomas has taken us as far as he can.
It's a shame really. I'ts been a good run show less
Not so this time around. Entire pages were dedicated to Koontz "holding forth" on the government and the state of the world by way of Oddie and other characters--pages that contributed nothing to the plot, nothing to character development, and only show more served as an impetus to skim the text and skip forward. I go to church on Sunday for sermons, I read my Bible when I want to understand universal truths, I pray when I want to talk to God, and I read the news when I need to know that our government is up to no good. But I read the Odd Thomas series because it's funny and profound and because--when he's doing his job--Koontz is the master of the well-turned phrase and he knows how to deliver the rising action.
The ending is the only thing that saved this story from failing completely and I almost didn't bother to finish it. This is why it's got three stars instead of one. If the rest of the story had delivered the way the ending did, I'd have no complaints.
I am questioning whether or not I will bother with the last book in the series. I know I won't recommend this one. Maybe Odd Thomas has taken us as far as he can.
It's a shame really. I'ts been a good run show less
I am a huge fan of the Odd Thomas series and I enjoyed travelling with Oddie again, but this installment was heavy on the politics and very light on the story. There were a couple of chapters where very little happened and the action/story seemed a mere backdrop for the cultural and political criticism. Odd doesn't like the reality TV. He also is distrusting of the government. I get it. But I came here for the story. If you stripped away the commentary you would have been left with a semi-interesting novella. Not the most compelling story line of what I think is a very good series.
I did like how it sets up what is probably going to be a very good 7th and final installment in the chronicle of the Odd one.
I did like how it sets up what is probably going to be a very good 7th and final installment in the chronicle of the Odd one.
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Dean Koontz was born on July 9, 1945 in Everett, Pennsylvania. He received a degree in education from Shippensburg State College in 1967. A former high school English teacher as well as a teacher-counselor with the Appalachian Poverty Program, he began writing as a child to escape an ugly home life caused by his alcoholic father. A prolific writer show more at a young age, he had sold a dozen novels by the age of 25. Early in his career, he wrote under numerous pen names including David Axton, Brian Coffey, K. R. Dwyer, Leigh Nichols, Richard Paige, and Owen West. He is best known for the books written under his own name, many of which are bestsellers, including Midnight, Cold Fire, The Bad Place, Hideaway, The Husband, Odd Hours, 77 Shadow Street, Innocence, The City, Saint Odd, and The Silent Corner. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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- Canonical title
- Deeply Odd
- Original title
- Deeply Odd
- Original publication date
- 2013-03-12
- People/Characters
- Odd Thomas; Annamarie; Mrs. Fischer
- Epigraph
- They followed the light and the shadow, and the light led them forward to light and the shadow led them to darkness. - T.S. Eliot, Choruses from The Rock, VII
- Dedication
- This book is dedicated to Stephen Sommers, who kept his promises in a world where no one does. With admiration and affection from the Odd author.
- First words
- Before dawn, I woke in darkness to the ringing of a tiny bell, the thimble-size bell that I wore on a chain around my neck: three bursts of silvery sound, a brief silence after each.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)I had learned enough about it that, for this sweet moment at least, I knew true joy for the first time in nineteen months.
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