In this post you get a two for one review. The main book is 77 Shadow Street by Dean Koontz. The prequel to this is The Moonlit Mind .
77 Shadow Street
The Pendleton stands on the summit of Shadow Hill at the highest point of an old heartland city, a Gilded Age palace built in the late 1800s as a tycoon’s dream home. Almost from the beginning, its grandeur has been scarred by episodes of madness, suicide, mass murder, and whispers of things far worse. But since its rechristening in the 1970s as a luxury apartment building, the Pendleton has been at peace. For its fortunate residents—among them a successful songwriter and her young son, a disgraced ex-senator, a widowed attorney, and a driven money manager—the Pendleton’s magnificent quarters are a sanctuary, its dark past all but forgotten. 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. Soon, all those within its boundaries will be engulfed by a dark tide from which few have escaped.
I had mixed feelings about this book. I think because there was so much hype surrounding it and its own cool website I was really excited and wanted to love it. But then I dove into the world of the Pendleton and didn't feel that way. This is a book that deals with a lot of supernatural creatures and Koontz just failed at describing them. I couldn't imagine half of the stuff he was talking about because the descriptions were so jumbled. I also was unaware of the timeline. I think it took place in 24 hours? But all of that was unclear, how long did they have to live in that miserable situation. There were just too many stories. How the heck was I supposed to keep up with all those people? And some of them just seemed to be thrown in there and have no purpose in the story. This had a lot of traits of Koontz's other books. Overall, it just felt unfinished and in the end Koontz seemed to just want to end the book. This book felt like it could have had so much potential. I gave it 3 out of 4 stars.
The Moonlit Mind (I believe this is a Kindle exclusive)
Twelve-year-old Crispin has lived on the streets since he was nine—with only his wits and his daring to sustain him, and only his silent dog, Harley, to call his friend. He is always on the move, never lingering in any one place long enough to risk being discovered. Still, there are certain places he returns to. In the midst of the tumultuous city, they are havens of solitude: like the hushed environs of St. Mary Salome Cemetery, a place where Crispin can feel at peace—safe, at least for a while, from the fearsome memories that plague him . . . and seep into his darkest nightmares. But not only his dreams are haunted. The city he roams with Harley has secrets and mysteries, things unexplainable and maybe unimaginable. Crispin has seen ghosts in the dead of night, and sensed dimensions beyond reason in broad daylight. Hints of things disturbing and strange nibble at the edges of his existence, even as dangers wholly natural and earthbound cast their shadows across his path. Alone, drifting, and scavenging to survive is no life for a boy. But the life Crispin has left behind, and is still running scared from, is an unspeakable alternative . . . that may yet catch up with him.
I liked this a lot better than 77 Shadow Street. The two really have nothing to do with one another accept that they are across the street from each other. It was simple and the plot was kind of creepy and whimsical. There were real people and not made up creatures I couldn't picture. There was some great symbolism in it specifically the moon. The one issue I had was that Koontz sets up some great symbols for the reader to figure out and then he ruins it by spelling it out for the reader. At times he left nothing to the imagination of the reader. I gave this book 4 out of 5 stars. It was drastically better than its later counterpart.
Happy reading!
Mackenzie
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