All fans of Koontz know of his deep affection for dogs. The heart-felt assessment of their loyalty, intelligence, and honesty in this novel—and the exciting forecast of the future of the ancient human-canine relationship—excels the treatment of the subject in any of the author’s other novels I have read. It is, of course, counterbalanced by an equally powerful threat to humanity. This conflict might be suggested by the title “New World Impending,” although “Devoted” also makes sense. Koontz’s abhorrence of deceit and brutality, his distrust of what we might call “The System” or simply Corruption fuels the plot, and his persistent optimism irradiates the conclusion.
His style, although as lively and urbane as usual, does demonstrate some of his editorial weaknesses as well. He commits an occasional error of diction: “. . . she had never been completely known to him, not down to the deepest roots of her psychology. . . .” The word “psychology” means the study of the mind, not the mind itself. He is also especially wary of using the preposition “like.” He prefers wordy substitutes like “. . . clever ways to communicate, similar to what Dorothy had arranged. . . .” or the peculiar (antiquated) use of “as” instead of “like”: “He had been as a child to Dorothy.” Presumably, one motive for this mannerism is that he fears using “like” as a conjunction, and yet more than once he makes this blunder: “. . . vanished much like Dracula, in those old movies, swirled his cape and became a bat and was gone” and “Sheriff Hayden Eckman felt his world fragmenting just like Thad Fenton’s skull had been cracked into pieces and pried apart.”
His mistakes in grammar are infrequent and follow no pattern, as in these two quotations, on adjacent pages: “Roger Austin, whom [correct] she knew to be an early riser . . .” and “. . . lawmen, whom [for “who”] he knew for certain were not corrupt. . . .” He once fails to make subject agree with verb: “. . . as was Vulcan and Bella and Kipp. . . .” And he is unreliable when it comes to distinguishing the verbs “lie / lay / lain” and “lay / laid / laid.” He gets it right 90% of the time, as in “. . . while the spirit of Woody lay [past of “lie”] abashed . . .” and “. . . a faint golden arc lay [past of “lie”] across floor and furniture. . . .” However, out of the blue we get “He circled and laid down and closed his eyes” [for “lay,” the past of “lie”].
One might best blame Koontz’s editor, however, for most of these slight faults, and they can all be forgiven for the sake of the splendid narrative, characterization, and hope that make this novel a joy to read.
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Excellent story; I even shared it with family.
I think it is up to you to read it and decide for yourself. Writing a review seems to cheat you out of finding out about the story. Okay, I’ll say this, loved the dog, hated the killer.
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