I’m a fan of Dean Koontz, so when I say that I wasn’t entirely pleased with What the Night Knows, you must understand that I’m not saying it was a bad read, or that it bored me. It’s a professionally constructed story, with appealing characters and gripping terror. But there were things that disappointed me about it.

As in so many Koontz stories, the action is sparked by a bigger-than-life villain. This one is Alton Turner Blackwood, a gigantic, deformed sexual sadist who has an extra advantage—he’s dead. He can possess inanimate objects or people, and he uses them to commit horrific sex murders against entire families. He especially craves young, innocent females.

Years ago police detective John Calvino, then a teenaged boy, walked in on Blackwood just after he had murdered Calvino’s family. Calvino shot him to death. But somehow Blackwood’s evil spirit endures, and he is determined to recreate his last string of murders, on precisely the same timetable, finishing up with Calvino and his wife and three children. Continue reading What the Night Knows, by Dean Koontz →