Adam Slonaker

This is definitely in the same vein as The Bad Weather Friend and Quicksilver—fantastical, fairly silly stories told in a subtly humorous, tongue-in-cheek voice, with plenty of fourth-wall-breaking asides directly addressing the various literary tropes and narrative choices found within the writing—which I will refer to collectively as “Dean’s Silly Works” Dean’s Silly Works in general and Going Home In The Dark in particular are not for everyone (the volume of single-star reviews on Google will attest to that), but especially not for those who read Koontz out of a desire for darkness, terror, tension, and action. Dean’s Silly Works have very little in common with the tone and atmosphere of, say, Phantoms, or Cold Fire, or his Jane Hawk series—to the extent that the contrast will probably be jarring to the unprepared. It should be acknowledged, too, that the sort of smart-assy, extremely self-aware prose that characterizes Dean’s Silly Works necessarily walks an extremely fine line between amusing and hacky. In my opinion, Koontz toes this line without crossing it—or, perhaps, he crosses it so blatantly and egregiously that it circles back to being amusing. To wit: an early scene in Going Home In The Dark in which three of the principal characters have a meal together contains a passage to the effect of “A lot of writers like to insert vivid, evocative descriptions of the food into scenes like this, but I’m not going to. Just understand that the food was good” which becomes a running gag that extends throughout the book, where every subsequent meal scene contains a brief reference to the narrative decision to omit descriptions of food in lieu of anything more descriptive than “the food tasted good.” While the initial aside may induce some to cringe, the joke is elevated by sheer dint of repetition. I thought it was funny, anyway. Humor is subjective; your mileage may vary. Anyway. I like Dean’s Silly Works. I like the idea of an iconic author of horror and thrillers, now pushing 80, saying, “You know what? Fuck it. Let’s do another silly one.” I like an omniscient narrator whose voice and editorial commentary makes them a character unto themselves. I liked this book.