Top FictionA blog about the best adventure, crime and spy novels to read.face mask

The Mask by Dean Koontz is completely out of the norm for me. I’ve never been one for scary books or movies. Watching Boris Karloff in the film The Mummy as a child, really did finish me off! Actually, if you ever want to see a true classic, way ahead of its time, then I can thoroughly recommend it for a fright night! But given the current Covid-19 virus obsession with ppe such as gloves and face masks, I thought that I would give it a go.

Also, I really enjoyed The Eyes of Darkness, again by Dean Koontz, which is eerily close to and some would say foretells the current Wuhan virus pandemic.

An enigmatic teenager with no family or discernible past suddenly appears amid busy traffic right in front of Carol’s car. She seems to have no memories.

Paul and Carol, feel an intense connection to the girl who they call Jane. They had no daughter and she filled an empty void in their lives.

But all is not as it seems!

Horrifying sounds in the night-time, gripping fear and a blood covered face in a mirror add to a terrible sense of dread and a sense of being haunted by something or someone!

Who was this girl, was she a victim in need of their protection or was there something darker in the terrible chain of events!

As I said, this scary genre is not for me, but for those wanting something to make the hairs stand up on the back of their necks then Dean Koontz is a writer par excellence and The Mask is well worth the read! Especially in this surreal time of people who buy and are wearing protective face coverings, face masks, gloves and even in one case a plastic bin on their head- but frankly – who could blame them! In this time of empty cities and scared people, it seems so very like a Hollywood virus film, but one we would rather not all be starring in!

For me however, I’ll stick to Koontz’s other works within the genres I prefer or I will try a Tom Clancy, Ido Graf or a Lee Child novel for a change of scenery. Happy reading!

Dean Koontz is a highly prolific and readable American author who has used many other names to write under. In fact he wrote this thriller novel in 1981 under the name Leigh Nichols. He has sold over 450 million copies of his works and was ranked in the top ten for highest paid world authors.

A camping trip in the mountains turns into a nightmare for one mothers son who is called Danny. Despite having gone on similar trips many times before, on the final occasion and with no explanation everyone dies. Finally the mother accepts the inevitable, that her son is gone.

However, she soon begins to receive threatening and cryptic messages about her son. They say that Danny is in fact, not dead. With the help of, Elliot Stryker, the mothers friend – she starts to try to unravel the mystery around her sons apparent death.

Many have said that there are striking resemblances in the fiction book The Eyes of Darkness with the current world pandemic of Corona virus which began in Wuhan, China. This has led to renewed interest in, what is, a very well written and insightful thriller novel from the early 1980’s by Dean Koontz.