Darkness Comes

by Dean Koontz

A short summary. This book is about a police officer, Jack Dawson who is assigned to a case investigating the strange deaths of the Caramazza mob family. Their deaths were very peculiar with their whole body seeming to be bitten by small creatures and bleeding to death. One by one, the Caramazzas are dying, and although they are scum Jack must solve the case before more people die. And even worse, it seems these creatures are going to come for not only Jack but his young son and daughter. The tiny creatures are coming, they are coming for them all...

I loved the first chapter of the book, where it was a scene of Jack's daughter in the dark with the creature coming from who knows where, the fear and anticipation was electrifying. Then after that scene it was pretty much flat all the way through. The whole story was predictable and all the characters were very corny. It seems the story was written like a cheap movie production; stringing along one horror scene to the next horror scene and some of these were decent but it all felt too rehearsed. Like okay I will scare you now a little, then we will have a little break, then I will scare you again. And by the end I felt there was some glaring holes in the plot. But I finished the book nonetheless. There are some good moments in the book, but overall I think it is not that worth reading. Koontz is said to be comparable to King, and I can see at moments his style works. However, based on this piece of work, I think King is much better story telling wise. I perhaps need to read a couple more of Koontz's books to have a better idea of things. But definitely will hold off buying any of his books until I have read a few more from the library.