Strangers in the Fright (Dean Koontz in general)

Member Name: Ophelia

Product:	Dean Koontz in general
Date:	23/10/02 (292 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Gripping, intriguing

Disadvantages: Unimaginative ending, lack of depth of characterisation

(NB This is a review of 'Strangers' by Dean Koontz. I will be asking for a specific category to be created and for this to be moved to it).


Several people find themselves driven towards the brink of madness. They are strangers and yet it seems they have far more in common than they realise.

Koontz?s ?Strangers? (for non-horror fans I ought to explain that it is all but compulsory for a horror book to have a one word title) tells the tale of these people and their struggle to understand what has happened to them, which leads them deep into danger.

THE PLOT

Koontz introduces us to several characters, each of which is having an inexplicable problem: sleepwalking, fear of darkness, blackouts, moon obsessions. These symptoms have arisen suddenly and without reason. Each of them is struggling to find a reason, yet it is only once they join forces that they are able to investigate the mystery.

They are lead to each other by a series of anonymously sent Polaroid photographs and meet up at the Tranquillity Motel, where it transpires that they all stayed at the same time the summer previously.

It becomes clear that they were witness to something secret at that time and have been brainwashed into forgetting. The mind blocks are leaking, resulting in the frightening obsessions and phobias, but they can only regain true piece of mind once they can discover the whole truth.

Their quest is a dangerous one. Who brainwashed them? What horrific things did they see? How can they get near the truth without risking their lives?

CHARACTERS

Koontz opens his book by introducing us to Dom Corvaisis, a writer who is suffering from bouts of sleepwalking. However, his night time activities are of a more disturbing nature than the average; in the light of day he finds that he has barricaded himself in his bedroom with a positive arsenal of guns or that he has typed five pages of writing b
ut all that is written on the page is ?I?m scared? repeated to infinity. Dom was a meek mannered man until the experience of the previous summer, since when he has become confident and had his first novel published. Beyond this Koontz gives us no insight into the character. We are told nothing of Dom?s past, in order to help us empathise with the character and we are given little insight into his thought processes. This seems a gaping omission considering the fact that Dom has such a major role within the book.

Our heroine could be said to be Ginger Weiss, a gutsy and determined (although petite and delicate looking ? Koontz aiming at contrast between personality and appearance in a most unsubtle manner) surgeon who is beset by panic attacks and blackouts. We are given a lot more information into her background; she is the daughter of a widowed Jewish man and her speech is, as a result, spattered with Yiddish expressions, which add little to the book or to the development of the character.

Other characters include Jorja (pronounced Georgia), whose only distinguishable feature seems to be that her mother was either eccentric or, more likely, illiterate. She is mother to Marcie, a little girl whose obsession with moons has begun to disturb her family. Despite the fact that Jorja and Marcie are main characters within the novel, once again Koontz does little to enlighten us as to their motives and personalities. Bizarrely, he gives us more of an insight into the life of Jorja?s ex-husband (who killed himself after his own moon obsession became too much for him to deal with).

There seems little point in introducing you to other characters, such as Ernie the nyctophobic or Father Brendan the priest who suffers from strange dreams and develops healing powers, as Koontz does little to flesh them out. Such an omission seems puzzling as he does provide us with a deeper understanding of some more minor characters such as Father Brendan?s m
entor, Father Wycazik, or Dom?s friend, Parker Faine.

Although there is a lack of depth in the personalisation of the characters it does not detract from the enjoyment of the book. It is the situation, the mystery and the fear which grips the reader and not the interaction or motivation of the characters. Koontz?s development of these aspects is superlative and grips you from the first page.

THE MOON?S A BALLOON (Apologies to David Niven)

Marcie?s obsession with the moon leads to her starting a scrapbook filled with pictures of the satellite, which she then colours in red. Watching the little girl constantly sitting colouring in her moon pictures with such a look of concentration and utter absorption on her face is very eerie. Why is she so absorbed and will her fascination lead ultimately to a spiralling into madness as it did with her father?

Dom and Ginger have had dreams about the moon. Dom has found himself awoken by his own screams of ?The moon! The moon!?.

For Marcie, her father, Dom and Ginger the moon obviously holds some strange significance. It inspires utter terror, an eerie fascination or an overwhelming attraction. Koontz?s description of these phenomena is intriguing and the reader is on tenterhooks while waiting to discover the origin of the moon?s importance.

For the other characters other objects or situations hold a strange fascination or terror. Ernie is crippled by his horrific fear of the dark and both he and Sandy, the Tranquillity Motel?s waitress, find themselves strongly and inexplicably drawn to a piece of land near the Motel. As Koontz describes these fears or attractions we continue to be gripped by the need to discover an explanation for these feelings.

FAMILIARITY BREEDS CONTEMPT

There is no doubt that the book is gripping. It is an intimidating 700 pages long and yet I was almost unable to put it down. There is one major aspect which let the book dow
n and that is its ending.

The denouement is well written and well explained but (and you knew there was a but coming) it is highly, highly unoriginal and clichéd. So well was the rest of the book written and the story skilfully weaved that I was prepared for a truly eye-opening finish to the book and was, therefore, hugely disappointed by the, not prosaic, but boring in comparison with what could have been conclusion.

Nevertheless, having settled for a rather unimaginative ending, Koontz does his best to inspire us with awe and succeeds in demonstrating how impressed the characters are by what has occurred. Perhaps if his characterisation had been a little more detailed we would have felt more empathy with the characters and, therefore, would have shared their amazement at the ending.

The final chapters may be unexciting and the characters may be a little shallow but the build up within the book is excellent. We are fed information piece by piece, as are the characters, and we are made thirsty for further knowledge. The strange phobias and manias are frightening as we hear them described and Koontz succeeds in chilling us to the bone and making us hungry for the next page.

I give this work 79% but if our Dean would care to rewrite the final few chapters, I will consider upping the mark towards the 90% mark!

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