Customer Reviews

Hideaway

5 star:		(67)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(11)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

Hatch has just survived a car wreck. Well, actually, technically he DIDN'T survive it--Hatch was clinically dead for 80 minutes. When he comes back, there is SOMETHING with him, a presence in his head...a mysterious, murderous character who calls himself Vassago, and yearns for nothing more than death and destruction...

But Hatch is determined to continue his life. He and his wife adopt a child. They live happily. But Vassago is closing in. He, too, is aware of the connection with Hatch, and he would relish the opportunity to ruin Hatch's life, and kill everyone he loves...

"Hideaway" is one of Koontz's all-time best...and also, as he points out in the new afterword, the first to receive hate-mail. Still, don't let a few letters get you down; "Hideaway" moves along at breakneck speeds, like most of Koontz's books, and features characters that are so real, you are genuinely afraid for--or of--them. This is one of the best books by one of the best authors out there, and shouldn't be passed up by suspense fans.

Dean Koontz is probably my favorite writer, and I have read most of his fifty or so novels. HIDEAWAY is a good Koontz novel, but I would say it ranks probably in the middle of his body of work.

The first 100 pages of this book are quite spectacular, with one of the major characters suffering a near death experience. Koontz' description of this experience, and the doctor's attempts to save him, are first-rate.

Unfortunately, the last 300 pages of this novel are kind of formulaic, if you've read Koontz' other novels. This novel eventually turns into another story about a depraved young serial killer stalking a young family. We get a lot of scenes from the psycho killer's point of view. HIDEAWAY then ends with a long chase scene and a big confrontation at the end between the heroes and the killer. I felt like I read variations of this story before, in novels like WHISPERS, SERVANTS OF TWILIGHT, MR. MURDER, DRAGON TEARS, THE FACE, and INTENSITY.

I also felt the characterization in this novel was a bit rushed. I wish that Koontz had spend more time developing the character of Regina, a young disabled ten-year old who plays a key role in HIDEAWAY. She is an attractive character, and I wish her role in this book was larger than it ultimately was.

Overall, this book is well done, but I would recommend several other Koontz books over this one, such as WATCHERS, ODD THOMAS, PHANTOMS, INTENSITY, FEAR NOTHING, COLD FIRE and the FRANKENSTEIN series.

If you’re a serial killer lover, a thriller chaser, a supernatural addict, or just another Koontz fan, Hideway is definitely worth your time. The characters are well written, the suspense is tight, the pacing swift, the ending brutal, and the middle never lags one bit. As always, Koontz injects moral lessons in his work, and they're hard to miss, but never preached to you. This novel is not as dark as some of Koontzs other stuff, but the atmosphere fits the plot. Another Koontz for the shelf!

After being a Stephen King fan for years and loving all that I had read, I decided to check out Dean Koontz, and Hideaway was my first. At first I was dissapointed, trying to get used to this new style of writing. It took me awhile to get into it, but when I did it hit HARD.

Hatch and his wife are traveling during a snow storm and they end up in a terrible car accident, rolling the car down the side of a cliffand into a freezing river. Hatch dies and after being worked on in the emergency room, is brought back to life after being dead for a record shattering amount of time. After his accident, the couple begin to learn to love life and are having a great time, but they miss their son who died of cancer years ago and decide to adopt a child-a crippled, spunky girl named Regina. She's lived a hard life of rejection and tries to turn them off by acting like a little brat, but she soon puts down her defenses and accepts their love and shows the sweet girl that she really is.

But it seems that Hatch's time in the land of the dead has done something to his mind. He's now seeing visions of murder and mayhem that terrify him and make him fear for his sanity. And now a vicious young killer is aware of Hatch's presence and is determined to track him down and kill him and his family.

The hellish setting at the amusement park was truly captivating, as was the killer's gruesome memory of pushing his friend off of an indoor roller coaster at a young age. It really sends shivers up your spine. The entire book was captivating as is the killer. He's young, handsome, and eerily polite, but he's a crazed demon man.

All in all, it's definetely one of my favorite books ever, an excellent introduction to Koontz, and I do look forward to reading it again. Intensity was my favorite, though.

I find that I am an off and on Koontz fan. Some of his novels I simply devour and consider the top of their genres (his books usually fit into several.) I also find that sometimes he disgraces himself as a writer, and this book illistrates one of those times. The opening of this book was very powerful and exciting; the female narrator's internal dialogue is both touching and emotionally truthful. But after that, the book slowly declines to a mediocrity. The book initially would have been worthy of a three star rating, but then came the ending. Never have I felt so let down by an ending, and this was a very cheap cop out by an author who aparently couldn't find any better way to get his character out of the situation. He ends up taking the ending out of his characters hands to symbolize something more devine and spiritual, and only ends up making his climax very anticlamitic. My advice, if you must by this book, read up to the point when husband and wife are at the hospital and stop there.

Mortally wounded in a car accident, Hatch Harrison is brought back to life by Dr. Jonas Nyebern. Despite being dead for 80 minutes, initially Hatch seems to have no ill effects from the accident and he and his wife Lindsay decide to take advantage of the extra chance at life and adopt a 10 year old handicapped girl named Regina. But Hatch is beginning to realize that everything isn't okay as he starts having strange visions of another man and unexplained moments of rage. Hatch soon realizes that he is somehow psychically linked with a serial killer that is killing people that Hatch knows. Now the killer is after Hatch's family and he's in the fight of his life as he battles to save his family.

"Hideaway" is an eerily effective novel about good vs. evil. Vassago, the serial killer, is one of the creepiest villains I've ever read about. His method of killings his victims and what he does with the bodies afterwards are chilling and gory, although Dean Koontz wisely doesn't go into graphic detail, letter readers use their own imagination. Lindsay and Hatch are likable protagonists, but it is plucky Regina who steals the novel and gives much needed humor and lightness to an otherwise dark story. She's a wonderful, likeable character and readers will route for her throughout the novel.

Koontz has a nice way with language, such as when he describes Regina going into her own "hideaway", yet at other times he overdoes it. He fills the book with imagery of spiders and the reader soon realizes that the Harrison's are caught in a web of terror. That's clever, but Koontz, either underestimating the intelligence of his readers or feeling a need to show how clever he is, explains to the readers what they've already figured out. He's a good writer and he should let the writing speak for itself. And the ending of the novel is thrilling except for the unfortunate description of how Hatch descends to the bottom of an elevator shaft. It was unintentionally hilarious and pulled me away from the tenseness of the moment.

Despite these flaws, I still recommend this chilling novel.

I first picked up Hideaway back in 1995, but being busy with school didn't have a chance to finish it before I had to take it back to the library. Now, more than ten years later I finally had the chance to pick it back up and finish it. Needless to say it was well worth my time.
As Hatch and Lindsey Harrison are on their way back from a weekend up at the lake where they tried and failed to recapture the magic that drew them together in the first place and was seemingly lost following the death of their only child to cancer, their car is knocked off the road and into a rushing river. Left alone with her seemingly dead husband, Lindsey struggles to fight her way to solid ground, but is rescued by a team of paramedics and born by helicopter to a hospital, where a brilliant cardiovascular surgeon manages to bring Hatch back to life. This brush with death has the effect that a weekend up at the lake didn't manage to achieve. After returning home, Hatch and Lindsey decide to try again to start a family. Since Lindsey is incapable of bearing anymore children, they adopt a disabled girl named Regina, a delighful innocent who helps bring meaning and purpose back to their lives.
But things take a disturbing turn as Hatch begins to experience surges of anger and hatred unlike his usual placid, easygoing manner. The targets of his rage, disturbingly enough, include the very driver who forced the Harrisons off the road and is later found murdered. As these disturbing visions and subsequent deaths continue, Hatch begins to question his own inocence and even his sanity. Becoming convinced that he somehow brought the killer back with him from the other side, Hatch only becomes more determined to right his perceived wrong when Regina is snatched from under their very noses. But the true identity of the Harrisons' bizarre adversary is far more disturbing than a simple molevolent spirit brought back from the underworld, and its connection to the man who saved Hatch's life makes it even more so. A gripping tale of suspense, with a shocking twist worthy of Koontz.

Hatch and Lindsey Harrison were driving in a March snowstorm when a beer truck drives their Honda off the road, down an embankment, and into a frozen lake. Lindsey frantically frees Hatch from the car before he can drown, but his wounds are too much and by the time the ambulance gets there he is dead. However, at the hospital Dr. Jonas Nyebern decides that because Hatch was in freezing water he is dead . . . but retrievable, even though it has been more than an hour. Miraculously, Nyebern resuscitates Hatch and given this second chance, the Harrisons celebrate each day they have been given. But then people who have done the Harrisons wrong start to die violently and we know before he does that there is a connection between his death and this evil.

Readers of modern horror stories will see some similarities between the initial situation that Dean Koontz has set up in "Hideaway" and Stephen King's "The Dead Zone." But whereas Johnny Smith always had the gift of foresight, Hatch Harrison finds himself trapped in a new world. Hatch remembers nothing of what happened during the time he was dead, but now he is having terrible visions. At first he thinks they are nightmares, but of course he is seeing horrible things that are really happening. If he did come back from the white light then it appears he brought something back when he was revived. Doubting his own innocence, Hatch is concerned for his family, which consists of not only Lindsey but also their newly adopted daughter, Regina, who wears a clunky leg brace and has a deformed right hand. Whatever is out there, it wants them all and it wants them for something big.

For me the set up of "Hideaway" is better than the payoff at the abandoned amusement park, which is a common complaint with me for books by both Koontz and King, not to mention most horror films. What is going on turns out to be something simpler than what I was thinking, which is then escalated to Satanic heights, which ends up constituting overkill for me. Then again, like with King's "The Stand," I definitely appreciate that Koontz told this story by bringing in both sides of the struggle as active participants. Far too often horror stories lay out the dark side without counterbalancing it with anything and leaving the main characters trapped against a wall instead of being caught in the middle, which is definitely what you get in this book. I was almost tempted to round up on the basis of how the Shakespeare quote at the start of the novel played out, but not quite.

Deep suspense. How are two lives thrown together? Why is the young man a killer? Why is the other man seeing things? Will they ever meet? Almost makes one cringe in sheer terror, as each chapter unfolds and each step is paved for more questions and more horror. Mr. Koontz......another job well done.

Hatch Harrison and his wife Lindsay are driving home from a vacation. Before they have time to react, Hatch and Lindsay become involved in a horrendous car accident that results in Hatch passing away. By the time they are taken to the hospital, Hatch has been dead for over an hour. However, Dr. Jonas Nyberg specializes in bringing people back from the dead, and manages to revive Hatch. Hatch and Lindsay see this as a gift from God and begin to live life to the fullest. They even adopt a handicapped 10 year old girl named Regina. However, just as things seem like they couldn't get any better, Hatch makes a startling discovery. Hatch's return from death has somehow linked his mind, with the mind of a deadly serial killer. As Hatch begins to see the victims through the killer's eyes, the killer also becomes aware of Hatch's presence. Now Hatch and his family are put in danger when the killer becomes obsessed with tracking them down.

Hideaway is definately one of the best Dean Koontz books I have ever read. The book drags you in after the first page, and keeps you there until the very end. This book is extremely captivating and terrifying. The premise is what makes the book so great. The subject of near death experiences and the afterlife is one that is extremely interesting. Koontz's take on the subject is very creative and original. The character development is amazing in this book. Koontz tells the story from two different perspectives. One being Hatch, and the other being the killer. You come to see the story through the eyes of both characters which makes the story very well rounded. The killer is perhaps one of Koontz's best villans because of how savagely brutal he is. The description that Koontz uses to describe each kill, will make you flinch at times.

Overall, Hideaway is one of Koontz's most terrifying and dark books. The characters are all great, the book is filled with action and suspense, and you will love Koontz's take on near death experiences and the afterlife.