Personal nu agreez deloc genul crime, dar m-am gândit că poate reușesc să citesc acest roman nu drept un policier, ci drept un Stephen King. Nu a funcționat, pentru că s-a străduit să bifeze tropii familiari (și probabil ceruți de fanii de policier). ( )

This was fantastic! As I am slowly working my way through my collection of Stephen King’s books, I am noticing just how versatile of a writer he is. I have had multiple people tell me that they won’t read King’s work because they don’t read horror. This book was violent at times but it fell firmly in the thriller category. I had a great time with this entertaining story.

I liked Bill a lot and was completely taken with this case. I wanted to see this retired detective solve this case and loved the fact that he seemed to be willing to do anything to make that happen. I had no idea how Bill would be able to catch this criminal so I found the book incredibly hard to set aside. The parts of the book that are told from the criminal’s point of view were sometimes brutal which helped the reader feel the urgency of catching him before he does anything else. I loved the supporting characters and thought that they added a lot to the story as well.

I listened to the audiobook and thought that Will Patton did an excellent job with the story. I thought that he did a great job with both the male and female character voices. I was pulled into the story through his narration and I thought that he added just the right amount of emotion to his reading. I do believe that his narration added to my overall enjoyment of this story.

I would not hesitate to recommend this book to others. I am glad that I finally gave it a chance and met this incredible cast of characters. I look forward to reading the next installment in the trilogy very soon. ( )

Just under a 4 star read for me, but good enough that I will continue with the trilogy. I believe this is the first book by Stephen King that I have read and I haven't been put off. This one wasn't a'scary' book so that probably helped ( )

Longer than it needed? ( )

So, Stephen King finally decided to write something that isn't horror, but rather "pure thriller" with no supernatural elements at all. I would probably be more surprised at how good it is if hadn't just read Different Seasons, which featured three short stories with no supernatural elements at all ... but then again even without reading that I'm not surprised. It doesn't seem like that big a leap (though for a crime writer to suddenly do horror ... I'm not sure that would go as well).

The ending had me at the edge of my seat, more or less, I was so annoyed that things (like work) kept interupting my reading time. Had it been shorter I might have finished it in a day.

So why only four stars? Mostly because of the writing. I don't know why, because I'm usually a fan of Stephen King's writing, but maybe he tried a different style here or something but I didn't enjoy it. First it's written in present tense, which is ugh, but I also felt like it did a terrible job of showing, rather than telling? This is not somethings that's ever bothered me in a King book before, so I was surprised that it did this time.

I guess in the end I will prefer reading his horror novels, but I still enjoyed this a lot. A lot more than I do crime/thrillers in general. ( )