77 Shadow Street (with bonus novella The Moonlit Mind): A Novel [Kindle Edition]

Dean Koontz (Author)

Book Description

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
 
Welcome to the Pendleton. Built as a tycoon’s dream home in the 1880s and converted to luxury condominiums not quite a century later, the Gilded Age palace at the summit of Shadow Hill is a sanctuary for its fortunate residents. Scant traces remain of the episodes of madness, suicide, mass murder—and whispers of things far worse—that have scarred its grandeur almost from the beginning.
 
But now inexplicable shadows caper across walls, security cameras relay impossible images, phantom voices mutter in strange tongues, not-quite-human figures lurk in the basement, elevators plunge into unknown depths. With each passing hour a terrifying certainty grows: Whatever drove the Pendleton’s past occupants to their unspeakable fates is at work again. And as nightmare visions become real, as a deadly tide begins to engulf them, the people at 77 Shadow Street will find the key to humanity’s future . . . if they can survive to use it.
 
Includes the bonus novella The Moonlit Mind.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Praise for Dean Koontz: 'A terrific pursuit story ... clever, up-to-the-minute, and riveting' Guardian 'There's surprise after surprise, including a killer finale ... a read-in-one-go novel' Independent on Sunday 'Velocity hits its pace from the first page and races through to a suitably climactic ending' Sydney Sunday Telegraph 'Dean Koontz is not just a master of our darkest dreams, but also a literary juggler' The Times 'Psychologically complex, masterly and satisfying' The New York Times

Review

Praise for Dean Koontz: 'A terrific pursuit story ... clever, up-to-the-minute, and riveting, Guardian 'There,s surprise after surprise, including a killer finale ... a read-in-one-go novel, Independent on Sunday 'Velocity hits its pace from the first page and races through to a suitably climactic ending, Sydney Sunday Telegraph 'Dean Koontz is not just a master of our darkest dreams, but also a literary juggler, The Times 'Psychologically complex, masterly and satisfying, The New York Times

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• File Size: 1678 KB
• Print Length: 451 pages
• Publisher: Bantam (December 27, 2011)
• Sold by: Random House Digital, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B004W3FJ0W
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray: Enabled
• Lending: Not Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,898 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

202 of 206 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Worth reading -- but not among Koontz's best December 27, 2011

By kacunnin TOP 500 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

Dean Koontz's 77 SHADOW STREET is not an easy book to describe. On the one hand, it's a fairly familiar haunted house tale in which generations of residents at a posh Victorian mansion are sucked into a terrible nightmare. On the other hand, it's Koontz's little jab at the modern world, which he sees as disintegrating around us, leaving us unprepared to combat the ultimate forces of evil. The house itself, once called Belle Vista and now the Pendleton, happens to have been constructed on something Koontz calls a "space-time trapdoor," which opens every 38 years to suck in the hapless people unlucky enough to be in the vicinity. This can be scary, if a bit derivative (you'll be reminded of THE SHINING, 1408, THE MIST, and even the TV series AMERICAN HORROR STORY). There's an evil presence called "One" (who wants ultimate dominion), and another called "Witness" (who will help him achieve it). There are creepy creatures galore, and a few really grotesque happenings. But somehow the novel didn't work for me.

The biggest problem with 77 SHADOW STREET is the way Koontz tells his story. There is a huge cast of characters, which are introduced slowly over the first half of the book through a series of vignettes told from differing perspectives. At first it's difficult to keep track of all of them; it's also difficult to get very attached to any of them. Devon Murphy is a security guard still mourning the loss of his mother, Bailey Hawkes is an ex-marine investment counselor, Silas Kinsley is a retired litigation attorney who finds himself researching the history of the Pendleton, Twyla Trahern is a country music composer with a precocious 8-year-old son, Mikey Dime is a hit man with psychopathic tendencies, the Cupp sisters are octogenarian cake-bakers, Sparkle Sykes is writer with an autistic daughter - the list honestly goes on and on (and I haven't even mentioned the characters from past generations of Pendleton residents). It's not that these characters aren't interesting - some of them are. It's just that there are so many of them, and the story jumps from one to the other in little mini-chapters which never allow the reader to become really invested in any of them. This makes it hard to care all that much what happens to them when things go crazy at horror house.

Additionally, there is an amazing lack of dialogue in this novel. For almost the entire first half, Koontz's many characters are isolated from each other, each in his/her own apartment. The story unfolds from their many perspectives, with Koontz telling us what's happening, describing events, even summarizing conversations that we never actually get to hear. It's an odd way of telling a story, especially with so many characters involved. It leaves us, as readers, distanced from the core of the action, and kept separated from the characters we're supposed to root for.

Ultimately, Koontz's story is interesting, and I can't say the book isn't worth reading. I grew tired of it, however, which isn't what I expected from a Dean Koontz thriller. And by the end, I wasn't invested enough in any of the characters to really care why all this was happening and what we were supposed to learn from it. "This world," one character says, "is a dark place, and hard." That much comes through very clearly in 77 SHADOW STREET. I was disappointed, however. Two stars for the novel; the additional one is for Mr. Koontz, whose books I have loved for decades. I will always be a fan.

87 of 90 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Wow...where do I begin? December 30, 2011

By EmilyJane1818

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I WANT to like books that I buy. I realize that it takes authors a great deal of time and effort to bring a book to fruition, and I feel horrible when I leave a negative review. Unfortunately, I'm about to feel horrible.

I've been a faithful Koontz fan for ages...Odd Thomas is one of my all-time favorite characters. And having read Dean Koontz for so long, I've come to think of his books ("Odd Thomas" and "Frankenstein" aside -- those are special) along the lines of, "If you've read one, you've read them all." He thinks of so many different ways to tell "good versus evil" stories, that even though the premise was the same in most of his books, they were still entertaining. However, not only was this book not, "Odd Thomas" or "Frankenstein," but it was also not like anything else I've ever read by this author. In fact, as I was reading this book, I wondered if Dean Koontz actually wrote it (the plethora of incomplete sentences was a big, unwelcome surprise).

The plot was far more science-fiction than horror or thriller. The storyline was weird. The suspense was lukewarm. Character development was pretty much nil. The ending was anticlimactic. I'm sorry to say that much of this book was REDUNDANT and BORING; I eventually got to the point where I just wanted to get reading it over with. It was during this time that I read only the first sentence of each paragraph for many of the chapters, and guess what? I DIDN'T MISS ANYTHING.

I guess the only part of this book that I actually did like was the advertisement for the new Odd Thomas book at the end.

84 of 90 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Infuriatingly descriptive December 30, 2011

By Sean Michael Newman

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Someone used the word "plodding" to describe this novel. That's one way to put it. Koontz has always been given to overuse of description, but this book was a nightmare. If little dialogue and action with lots of description is your thing, this is the book for you. If you hate getting bogged down in details of how something looks or pulsates or sounds, etc., where every paragraph is a challenge to your patience, steer clear and wait for the next Odd Thomas.

More About the Author

I was born and raised in Pennsylvania where I graduated from Shippensburg State College (now Shippensburg University). When I was a senior in college, I won an Atlantic Monthly fiction competition and have been writing ever since. My first job after graduation was with the Appalachian Poverty Program, where I was expected to counsel and tutor underprivileged children on a one-to-one basis. During my first day on the job, I discovered that the previous occupier of my position had been beaten up by the very kids he had been trying to help and had landed in the hospital for several weeks. The following year was filled with challenge but also tension, and I was more highly motivated than ever to build a career as a writer. I wrote nights and weekends, which I continued to do after leaving the poverty program and going to work as an English teacher in a suburban school district outside Harrisburg. After a year and a half in that position, my wife, Gerda, made me an offer I couldn't refuse: "I'll support you for five years," she said, "and if you can't make it as a writer in that time, you'll never make it." By the end of those five years, Gerda had quit her job to run the business end of my writing career. Gerda and I, along with our dog, Trixie, live in southern California.

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#68 Overall (See top 100 authors)

#2 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Horror

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#14 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy

#18 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Fantasy

#2 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Horror

#13 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction

#14 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers

#14 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy

#18 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Fantasy