Krishna
We have reviewed several books from this prolific author before : For instance, 12/13/63 or Revival as samples. This one is a good book as well and definitely absorbs you into the story.
Peter Jackson driving a car in Nevada when his wife Mary sees a dead cat nailed to a stop sign. Then a police car acts weirdly and flags them down and the cop is a giant. All these make them scared as there is not a soul for miles around.
The cop finds a pack of weed in the spare tire compartment and all hell breaks loose. Desperation is a city in Nevada desert and that is where the cop comes from. He takes them to a jail where a girl has already died in the stairs. He throws her inside and in cold blood shoots Peter.
Ellie and Ralph Carver are other prisoners whose daughter Kristine was the girl who had died on the stairs. Their story comes next, and later, you learn that this policeman has killed his two colleagues and is running wild. A famous and ageing writer is the next one brought in. The man seems to be collecting people to torment.
The literary lion Johnny is trapped into the deal when he goes for a motorbike ride across America in a quest to find material for a nonfiction work to revive his flagging career.
Steve, his assistant and a girl called Clarence go in search of him and find the motorcycle by the side of the road. They find the bike but feel that they are being watched. You want to scream when they decide to go to Desperation to get help from the cops to find the author.
And it turns out that David, the son of the couple who were held, has some divine powers and the cop kind of feels it, even in his crazed state. The story then goes back in time to explain how David saved the life of a friend who was dying due to a head injury by concentrating and ‘praying’ as he thinks it. Lovely.
Now when the cop, who now has a name Entragian – takes David’s mother, David asks God to intervene. But he takes her in his car and it is interesting to see that he seems to be losing body parts slowly and blood seems to ooze out of him slowly. So it is not just a mad cop? Is there something more going on?
David slips through the jail bars, evades a coyote that is standing guard and escapes out, promising the others that he will be back. He brings a gun back and also finds the keys. Shocked to find her sister (and others) hung like animal carcasses on hooks.
The duo of Steve and Clarence also see a similar scene but there is a statue that seems to disturb their mind and put them in a trance whenever they even touch it.
David uses keys to open the bars after killing the coyote that is on guard with a gun. They all join up to try and escape on foot, after collecting an arms cache from the police station. There are weird things happening where snakes and vultures try to kill Steven and the girl as if they are specifically targeting the pair. When a swarm of scorpions come out of the mud to attack the large truck they are in, they really get scared.
They realize that something is trying to keep them in the city. At that time, Dave manages to get cell signal just by handling the phone and calls Steven and asks him and the girl to join them.
They finally meet in a theatre after David talks to the coyotes and makes them go away by his mental power. In addition, Steve sees further evidence of other animals (spiders) being controlled to kill and ready to attack an intruder. A big rate attacks Steve who escapes. This is before they all meet, and also rescue another woman on the way. They wonder why Entragen did not kill this particular group.
David apes Bible and provides food for everyone out of a tiny box of crackers and some sardine cans. (They multiply endlessly). A leopard is now commanded by the other worldly thing and waits for them outside where they have taken refuge. There is a hint about how the evil may have come into town (an old mine). The leopard attack and the resulting mayhem are great and when you find that Audrey, the last member to join the group has lied about herself and is an agent of the “unformed” the evil entity, you get a shock.
She nearly gets David but in the meanwhile, Mary is carried off by the unformed, now in Ellen Carver’s body. There is an amazing scene where Audrey transforms into her absolutely crazy self, her hand comes off, and she dissolves into an obscene thing but not before she almost hipnotizes the novelist with a small set of stone statues, making him want to kill the boy.
Meanwhile the boy has a weird experience where a dream takes him around the mines and he tells the others, when he comes to, that they have to go to the mines. He then tells the amazing stories of how those small statues came to be – how the people stumbled upon them and went nuts and how they were buried alive rather than letting the evil spread through the town and how it nevertheless escaped. It is interesting that except for affecting two Oriental workers how it was contained until another miner crew blasts a hole and one person goes in alone to investigate and gets fully infected, starting the chain of that man, a black acquaintance of his, and then Collie Estragian, whom we met in the beginning of the story. Fascinating.
The author says goodbye and leaves in a truck. He does not want to go to the mine but they can defect the evil only if they are all together. In the meanwhile Mary comes to in an abandoned plot and realizes that she will be the next host for the ‘can tah’ or the bigger demon. She makes her escape, guided by an inner voice.
David senses that John Melville, instead of leaving, is attacked by a wolf and is ready to come back and goes after him, instructing the rest of his gang to go help Mary.
Johnny is convinced to come back after seeing the wallet from David and after killing a wolf with a lucky (or divinely guided) shot with a hammer. Mary almost gets away from the demon by outrunning it first. But the demon gets into a kite and Johnny repents and joins the group after being given a wallet by David.
It is really cool how one of the members of the gang realizes that it is not David who is meant to make the ultimate sacrifice and how that person steps up to it. Ending is great and logical.
Nice book, retains your interest.
7/10
– – Krishna