The novel “Deeply Odd” by New
York Times best selling author Dean Koontz teeters on being deeply awful.
Derived in May, “Deeply Odd”
is average at best. Returning character Odd Thomas has paranormal abilities and
can see glimpses of the future. His terrifying vision of three siblings burning
to death fuels his quest to seek them out and save them.
The children are eight, six
and 10-years-old retrospectively. A 70s clad cowboy truck driver complete with
rhinestones on his attire is one of the many Satanist trying to kill Thomas.
Both Thomas and the cowboy have the ability to blind people with their mind or
the ability to be unseen by their prey. To be honest, I cannot remember.
While venturing out to find
and save the children, Thomas rides along with 80 plus-year-old Mrs. Edie
Fischer. Thomas becomes her limo driver and the two become a humorless team to
thwart a satanic cult.
Both Thomas and Fischer have
flashes of interest and sometimes make the reader laugh, but ultimately they
are a boring pair. While Fischer and Thomas are pursuing the satanic cowboy,
they learn that 17 children are to be sacrificed by a group of devil worshipers
known as the Prostar plus congregation.
I’ll give Koontz credit for
not having a single profane word and managing a PG rating for such a heavy
themed story, but “Deeply Odd” is deeply dull. The names alone didn’t help the
stories credibility. Two of the Satanist where named Ken # 1 and Ken # 2, in
reference to Barbie’s beau. One of Thomas’s ghost dogs was named Boo. Maybe
Koontz was attempting to write a children’s novel involving sadistic murders
and devil worship?
Most of the comedy in “Deeply
Odd” was not funny, and its climatic journey into a path of predictability
could only beget the book a two star rating.
