Odd Hours - the latest book by Dean Koontz (updated 7.4.2009)

I was walking through the store on my break, heading to the grocery side to grab some pop for my boyfriend for work last night, and on my way back to the checkouts I stopped mid stride and said two simple words.

"No fair."

I had just seen the sign above the books that proclaimed one of the new releases was by Dean Koontz.  As I approached the shelf, the glossy, shiny surface of the book revealed to me the title of Koontz's newest book.  Odd Hours.  Wait, Odd Hours?  No way was this another Odd Thomas book.  I had no idea there would be a FOURTH one!  So incredibly unfair.  I was caught completely off guard.  I read the little teaser on the dust jacket and put the book back, debating whether or not I could wait the countless months until it came out in paperback.  Needless to say, I couldn't.  I managed to wait for the other three to come out in paperback before I even read them.  But I had been in the mood for a new story lately, and it seems that the publisher had read my mind.

So I bought the book (and my boyfriend's pop) and put it in the employee locker area until I went to lunch.  As a gruelling two and a half hours crawled by (on its belly, through hot coals no less) I waited impatiently until my lunch would be covered and I could rush out to my car and start devouring my new book.  When the time finally came I got out to my car and settled in for the quickest half hour lunch I've had yet.  In tweny minutes I had read 33 pages and was hooked.

By 11 pm last night I had the book finished - I was confused, happy, sad, and already debating when I should start reading Odd Thomas so I could read all four in a row.  The book was good and fast moving, taking place with Odd in the seaside town of Magic Beach.  From the opening pages to the very end, in true Odd Thomas (and Dean Koontz) style, you are pushed, pulled, prodded, and thrown into a story line that keeps getting odder and odder (pun intended ;).  From talk of tsunamis to potergeist singers to little old ladies with guns, this book keeps you wondering.  The ending is as cryptic and any other and is truly one to leave you hanging by a thread and scratching your head in confusion and wonder.

UPDATE:  Okay, I was just poking around the Dean Koontz official website and apparently there are going to be a total of SIX Odd Thomas books!  Yay!  =)  I'm sure no one else really cares, but that makes me happy!  More new stuff for me to read!  Oh, yeah, and the conclusion to the Frankenstein trilogy will be out in 2009!  Yay!