I didn’t know anything about this book before reading it, other than it was a crime story. I’m not the biggest fan of crime stories, I probably haven’t read the right ones. I picked this book because it was the new Stephen King book out in paperback and cheap because of that. I started reading it Saturday morning, thinking I’ll read a couple of chapters before breakfast and before I knew it I was over a hundred pages in and couldn’t put it down. That’s something people say a lot about books, but it’s a good cliche and very true in this case. I had to know what happened next. I would recommend this straight away to anyone.

It’s hard to talk about this book without giving spoilers, so be warned. There will be spoilers from this point on. Nothing major, just enough to say why I liked this book so much.

I was enjoying this book quite a bit as a crime story. I’m not too familiar with the genre so I was along for the ride. I was piecing clues together and not getting very far. A man being in two places at once and I was jumping to the obvious conclusions, one of them was an impostor. I thought it would be simple enough like that, but I was still enjoying the book. Probably would have finished it, had a good time and mostly forgot about it.

That changes around half way through. On Saturday night I was sitting up in bed reading, trying to figure out the growing mystery when the plot started twisting. Slowly at first, but then the twist really hit. I stopped reading and thought I had stumbled into an all out horror without realising it. I put the book down with chills shivering through me.

It and Dracula combined with a crime novel makes The Outsider. Two of my favourite books. I loved this book and finished it within two days. Stephen King has a knack for creating characters that I care about way beyond the plot. I wish every writer was this great at building up characters. I want to know what happens next to them and I think that’s the trick to anything horror. If I care about the characters it adds to the fear. I’m not just scared of something, I’m fearing for the character’s lives.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys crime or horror. It’s a mixture of crime and horror. It’s a chilling read with twists and I really enjoyed it.

Thanks for reading,

Ashley