Horror Aficionados discussion

I thought that we could use a discussion on Dean Koontz. I have read nearly all of Koontz's novels and all of Stephen King's novels, and I have reached a conclusion that a lot of people might hate me for: I think that Dean Koontz is a better author than Stephen King. By this I mean that I believe Koontz to be a more talented writer. I think his stories flow better and, at least with me, keep me so interested that I read his books in a day or two, and not just because they are usually shorter than King's. I'm talking about eighties Koontz like Darkfall, Shadowfires, and Twilight Eyes here. However, I think King has had some better ideas for novels than Koontz like Pet Sematary, The Shining, and Under the Dome. It is a hard choice, but I like Dean Koontz slightly better.
But that's my opinion. What's yours?

Hi Adam, I haven't read any Koontz but yesterday as I was browsing the second hand book section of the newspaper, I came across an ad for 15 of Koontz books for $30 AUD. I nearly bought them but really didn't know much about him as an author.

Koontz is amazing but I think it really depends on what you like. He has written books in numerous genres, and some of his novels combine gentes. If you are into horror, try Phantoms. Crime, The Good Guy. Scifi, maybe Demon Seed or By the Light of the Moon. Story about a lovable dog, A Big Little Life. Romance is in most Koontz books. I would say just look through his books if you can and pick one that sounds interesting. You should be intertained.

Trace, you can't go wrong with buying a collection of Koontz novels for that price. He is a top notch writer, some books more in the horror genre, others more in the suspense genre, but they are all very good and definitely worth reading.

I can't think of anything by him that I wouldn't recommend, except for his real early ones but those are almost impossible to find anyway.

Thanks , I may give some of them a try. Not so much into the romance aspect of books though!!

Well, Koontz just has stories where the characters who are good show romantic qualities towards each other. They definitely aren't like romance novels.

My faves by Koontz

Watchers
Lightning
The Face of Fear

Tick Tock was kind of weird. It turned into a comedy towards the end. I liked that the hero was Vietnamese-American and the use of folklore from that culture.

Midnight was pretty bizarre, and so was The Vision. The villain was one sick puppy!

I loved Twilight Eyes, Watchers, Mr Murder. Greate books. I think he started to go off though in his later works. I was annoyed at Tick-Tock. I wanted horror, not comedy.

The Bad Place was my favourite, but I've enjoyed everything I've read by him. He has an easy, accessible style.

Yeah, I remember the Vision too. Creepy stuff. That and probably Whispers were his scariest books in my opinion. Some people might also say Intensity but that wasn't scary to me: awesome beyond belief but not really scary. I wish Koontz would go back to true horror for a while, but he never wanted to be labeled as a horror author.

He tends to have a non-paranormal explanation for seemingly supernatural occurrences, at least in most of the books I've read by him.

HI Adam, I like to think of myself as a gourment of both King & Koontz! My first King was The Gunslinger, my fisrt Koontz was Watchers. I don't think Koontz writes better then King, just different. King will do some shit that makes you go "Damn did he really do that" and Koontz almost always has some kind of "Religious overtones" which I don't mind at all from either one. I don't think they write bad books, just that they can't make everyone happy all the time. I love Hideaway, and someone else my think that his religious tone doesn't sit well with them. I love The Dark Tower books, but someone else might find all the back and forth that King does, to much to have to pay attention to, or keep up with. There's a group for Dean Koontz called Koontzland, that I recently quit because of to much ripping him and his books apart, for that reason. I've read alot from both men, but I still got alot to go. I'm reading The Dead Zone right now, so far so good. :)

I used to read nothing but Koontz books for a couple of years in the 90's. I loved him. I say "loved" because I can't stand his latest books. Some of them I could not even finish. I think I am not alone on this, and that is why they rip him appart in his own group.

I just started reading King a couple of months ago and so far I have read 4 of his books. I think I like Koontz better (the earlier Koontz...) but it is still too soon to tell.

I can fully understand why some people don't like some of his books, but no one should do that much ripping, tearing, and shredding of him or his books to such a negative degree as what they did. If anyone wanted to be so mean, hurtful, and disrespectful, there should be a site just for that, so those of us that did like the book can talk about it without what we say being torn to bits. I'm not saying that, whoever, can't have a bad opinion about whatever, but i'm asking that they not rain on everyone else's parade. That's the only group that i've been in that does that. We don't do that here, or any of my other groups. That's why I quit that group. There's some really good people there, but speaking for myself, I couldn't stand anymore. I'm a Dean Koontz fan, through the good, the bad and the ugly. :)

Lori wrote: "I can fully understand why some people don't like some of his books, but no one should do that much ripping, tearing, and shredding of him or his books to such a negative degree as what they did. I..."

I agree with you.

Thank you Elena, they made me feel like I was in the wrong by asking that just for once not to rip a part a book. That if they didn't like it to say "Hey I didn't like that book" and go on. But no they couldn't do that. So I left. That's one thing I love about this group, we all may not like the same book, movie, whatever, but we're never disrespectful to eachother.

I can't believe you left Koontzland. That had to be one of your favorite groups. Wonder if Chris will leave because I rip on Ed Lee?

I have tried and tried to like Koontz, but I just don't.

I like King much better than Koontz. Granted, I've read much more King than Koontz. Like King, Koontz writes outside of horror, but is stuck with the horror writer label. I really enjoyed By the Light of the Moon, my 1st Koontz read. I've read most of his later 2000's works (The Husband, The Good Guy, etc., which were okay mystery/thrillers). I last read Icebound, an adventure/thriller, liked it, didn't love it. I hated Demon Seed. I've been meaning to read more of his books. They are sitting on my shelves just waiting...

The only Koontz I read recently was The Strangers. It's a good story that had me hooked from page one, but I feel it could have used some editing to make it a tighter story. There was a lot of repetition in it I felt was unnecessary after a while.

He does tend to repeat himself a lot. It's as if he's afraid his readers have forgotten something he's already told us earlier. It's one of the reasons I stopped reading his books; they felt dumbed down.

So, Koontz lovers, what would you consider his best book? Maybe I'll bump it up...

Lori wrote: "I can fully understand why some people don't like some of his books, but no one should do that much ripping, tearing, and shredding of him or his books to such a negative degree as what they did. I..."

--I'm not fond of author bashing. That's a consistent rule on my author-focused groups.

Watchers is my favorite Koontz book.

I keep hearing Watchers mentioned as a good Koontz book. Will have to give it a go some time.

Tressa, I have to admit I loved it for the romance.

I don't author bash that's just a waste of time but if I think a book is a dud I'll call it a dud and then tell you why I thought so. That said, Koontz and King have had many a dud and I love/despise their books equally. Don't ask me to pick between them because I can't do it. I'll focus on my favorites:

King: Pet Semetary, Bag of Bones, The Stand, Carrie, The Cell
Koontz: Watchers, Odd Thomas, Phantoms, Tick Tock (the abridged audio version absolutely cracked me up, the narrator was fantastic)

I like lightening and Midnight

The last Koontz book I read was Tick Tock

BarkLess, I agree with you about author-bashing. Nothing wrong with saying you don't like a book or an author and why, but to be hateful and mean about it is something I don't like.

I'll try Watchers as soon as my copy is unpacked. I've got most of my books in boxes right now.

Watchers is good. Of course, if you add a golden retriever into any book I'm buying it.

Oh, yes. Einstein made that book. Loved him!

I really liked Watchers, but I don't think it's Koontz's best work. I would vote for False Memory. That was a brilliant novel.
Also, I must say, since I started the debate between King and Koontz on here, that Koontz is slightly better in my mind. I love both of them and sometimes I second guess myself and put King above him for the Dark Tower books. Greatest series ever written I think.

I finally found a relatively local book swap yesterday and there were quite a few Koontz novels there but I do you think I could remember the name of a good one that was posted here?? NO!!
So I grabbed Velocity. I hope it's good!

Trace, I loved Velocity. It's one of his newer ones. I don't think it's really horror but with Koontz you really can't go wrong. Velocity is more of a suspence story with a creepy killer and some tough choice for the main character.

I just found this thread so I'm coming in a little late. As moderator for the Koontzland - Dean Koontz group, I want to say that I don't feel we are "author bashing". Yes, some group members are more critical than others but everyone there is a fan of Dean Koontz in some degree or another. I have done my best to create a welcoming group, but it is impossible to please everyone.

For Lori & other fans, I'm glad you have this thread as well as the one in Stephen King Fans to participate in.

Adam wrote: "Trace, I loved Velocity. It's one of his newer ones. I don't think it's really horror but with Koontz you really can't go wrong. Velocity is more of a suspence story with a creepy killer and some t..."
That's great I like a good suspense also! It has to go on the back burner at the moment though as I have so many others to get through!

Velocity is the one that hooked me in and I've been a Koontz fan ever since. Koontz has written so many books that I think Koontz has something for everyone but everything Koontz might not be for everyone :-) My favorites are: Life Expectancy, Cold Fire, By The Light of The Moon and The Bad Place. I really liked Relentless (2009) but a lot of fans weren't crazy for it like I am :-)

I wasn't all that impressed with Relentless. I didn't like the supernatural parts of it. I like Koontz for some supernatural stuff, especially his older novels, but now it just seems pretty weak. I that the same thing about Breathless. I'm not saying bad things about the stories he is writing because I still love anything he puts out there, I just think Relentless would have been better if it were more realistic.

I've read Relentless twice now. I was absolutely in love with the book the first time. I was rather put off by Koontz's release just prior Your Heart Belongs to Me (one of my very least favorite Koontz books). So, Relentless restored my faith in Koontz :-) I re-read it again earlier this year I still loved the story but the ending not so much as I did the first time. Breathless needed to be longer - and usually I don't say that because I don't like long books but this one was less than 350 pages and some things didn't get explained or resolved - it could have been a lot better, but I still liked Breathless better than Your Heart Belongs to Me.

Dustin, I have to agree with you there. I didn't like Your Heart Belongs to Me Either. I like long books but Koontz can usually do a good story without them needing to be over 450 pages or so but Breathless was all over the place with it's different characters. The only thing I can compare it to is if King had condensed the Stand into a 350 page book and just kept switching around a lot. Your Heart Belongs to Me might have been better if it was just better explained, but I doubt it. I actually read a book called Eden's Eyes by a much less famous author (Sean Costello) with almost the same story, only Costello's novel was really good.

Adam wrote: "I actually read a book called Eden's Eyes by a much less famous author (Sean Costello) with almost the same story, only Costello's novel was really good. "

Interesting.

I didn't become a Dean Koontz Fan until 2005 when Velocity was published. I had read Watchers a year earlier but unlike most fans, it isn't one of my favorites. I recently re-read Watchers and I still feel the same way, but most people love it. I loved "the Outsider" character/creature that Koontz created in Watchers though, he did an awesome job with that :-)

With any Koontz book, a reader must put aside reality to some degree or another which I can do :-) I think more than any other, By the Light of the Moon requires you to expect the unexpected - anything could happen. Personally though, even as big of a Dean Koontz fan as I am, I can not read more than two Dean Koontz books in a row and maintain my sanity. I have to take a break from Koontz once in a while :-)

I loved By the Light of the Moon. That was the first Koontz book I ever read. I started reading his novels in 2008 and started with the beginning of the alphabet and worked my through to Y. I loved all of them, except for the Taking. It lacked Koontz's usually vivid characterization. A good book, but I didn't think it fit Koontz's name, even when thinking about his vast range of subjects and character types.

I`ve read loads by Mr Koonz , Watchers and Phantoms being 2 of my favourites , but what I really wanted to know was who has read the Christopher Snow books Fear Nothing and Sieze the Night , these I really loved , set in moonlight bay , with a lead character who can`t be exposed to sunlight , the first 2 books were great , but as a supposed part of a trilogy he has not got round to writing the 3rd book yet , can`t remember how long its been since the last one , I just wish he could finish the story , as much as I like Odd Thomas , I want to know the end of the trilogy !

I read the first one in the trilogy called Fear Nothing and enjoyed it. The only novels left for me to read by Koontz (not counting about twenty of his very earliest ones that not many people know about), are Seize the Night and the Odd Thomas books. I don't have a huge desire to read Seize the Night after reading Fear Nothing. I'll read it eventually, but I think I just needed a long break from Koontz after reading all of his books in a little over a year.

There's no word yet on Christopher Snow #3 although it's been promised for years. Also no word on Odd Thomas #5 - it's been two years since Odd Hours was released! I plan to re-read The Taking and Fear Nothing in the near future. In Koontzland, we have monthly group reads as well as a mini-group read program (although no one has taken advantage of that yet :-) if anyone's interested. We only read Dean Koontz titles in that group.