Another masterpiece by Koontz with his usual mix (that being laughter, sorrow, shock and countless hour of sleep lost due to being engaged in the book). As always with Koontz the characters are realistic and relatable allowing you to fall in love with particular characters within a handful of chapters. I found myself laughing more than usual with this one, although there were countless moments in which I felt myself saying ‘no’ due to my heart breaking. But of course, to say any more on either of those would be to spoil the story for you. Whilst it may seem like a daunting read it is most certainly worth it. As a fan of larger books I did not mind the length at all, although I’m sure that other readers will easily find themselves wrapped up in the storyline questioning how they managed to get through so many pages so quickly. This book also contains the masses of knowledge that you would expect to find with almost any Koontz book – with the area of specialities being phobias. I’m sure by the end of it your phobia knowledge will be greatly enhanced!

Dean Koontz is on top form in this tense book, full of plot twists to keep you guessing. It is quite long but the pace is sustained very well.

This was my first Dean Koontz read, and it had been recommended to me by several friends. To me, his writing is different, and it is certainly disturbing. I came out of the end of this book wondering if the author himself is more than a little bit twisted. But then, that could be an indicator of extremely clever writing. Following the same lines as Psycho, the story hinges on the convincing of the victims that they are suffering from pshycological problems, and that they need help. Hypnotism is the key, and the keywords and triggers associated with that art or science are the essential ingredients to some very scary plot lines. To go any further might spoil the read for you, but what I have said so far is blatantly apparent very early on in the book. There are parts of this which were too predictable for me, but that complaint is counter-balanced by the fact that there were many events which were not predictable, and which were downright gruesome. This is a great read and I would recommend it to any adult who can cope with the violence and the fear. Enough of it is realistic enough to have one looking over one's shoulder, although there are parts which made me think "that could never happen." I woul dhave been tempted to give this five stars if it had been less than five hundred pages. The size of the volume has often put me off reading Koontz before now. Luckily, I was on vacation, so I had plenty of time to wade through this one in a couple of days. Maybe next year I shall pick up another offering from this author.