BlogaBook

The Taking by Dean Koontz
The Taking by Dean Koontz (Find this book in our catalog)“A few minutes past one o'clock in the morning, a hard rain fell without warning. No thunder preceded the deluge, no wind.� Thus begins The Taking by Dean Koontz. The rain wakes Molly Sloan, a 28-year-old author, who until now has been living quietly in a house in the woods with her husband, Neil. Bit by bit we learn, however, that Molly has suffered violence in the past, violence that influences Molly’s present. The rain glitters oddly and smells faintly repellant. The rain also affects a pack of coyotes, who come up onto Molly’s porch and seem to be looking to her for leadership. Woken by a nightmare of an oppressive force overhead, Neil joins Molly in front of the TV and they learn of extreme weather all over the world. Gradually all communications go dead, but not before Neil and Molly have realized that probably the end of the world they know has come and that they must go to town to seek other people and safety in numbers. Readers of all ages will enjoy this book, which is hard to categorize – science fiction, horror, or speculative fiction. The Taking will certainly make you think! Readers in the late teens or early twenties will relate to the main character, Molly Sloan, who is scared, puzzled, loving, caring and brave. The other characters are convincing and well-drawn, though the writing is succinct and concentrates on the action and the mystery of what’s happening to all the humans, who are trapped, are changed, or disappear in violent and gruesome ways. This book is a page-turner, going rapidly from one horror to the other, yet so well written that the monstrous events seem logical and totally believable. Molly gradually begins to make sense of the horrors she is witnessing and decides what it is that she is called to do.