Deeply Odd Review
Deeply Odd is a hard book to review. For the first time in this series, you must have read all previous volumes of Odd's adventures to receive the grand picture. Throughout Deeply Odd, our fry-cook-turned-reluctant-hero hearkens back to every other novel (aside from Forever Odd, of course, as I believe even Koontz knows that book is only worth forgetting). This is important to the average reader because if you have not read the other books, you will be bored beyond all hope.
Odd rambles and rambles, going over previous outings and world views, with his unique wit and sarcasm. Unfortunately, here in the seventh Odd Thomas novel, he's starting to wear on my nerves. It's come to a point where I just want him to shut up and get on with the story.
The story is the only reason this book garnered even the two stars I gave it. Like the second in the series, Forever Odd, Deeply Odd drags on, ad nauseum, with descriptions of litter and plant life that do absolutely nothing to progress the story further, but seem to act as nothing more than filler to expand the word count so that his publisher can sell an outrageously priced ebook. As I said in my review of Gaiman's The Ocean At The End of the Lane, I don't mind paying fifteen bucks for an electronic file... if the story's worth it. But when it takes until the 84% mark for your book to get even remotely interesting, I require a drastic cut in price. The problem, and the truth of the matter, is this. I'm going to buy the next one, and the next one after that, and so on, because I love Odd Thomas. And the publisher, along with Koontz himself, knows this.
The story inside the pages of Deeply Odd is an afterthought to Odd's mental meanderings. Every scene of action (what few there are in the first 84% of the book) only serve to give odd a speaking platform on which he riffs about Mommy Porn, consumerism, "The Real Housewives of Wherever" (that's an actual quote from the book), and the over all shitty nature of our hairless ape society. It's book seven, Dean, I think we understand... the world's gone to pot, and the bad people far out number the good, but Odd must continue to tell us he sees some thread of hope, all while speaking of himself in an unkind manner. We get it! He doesn't think he's a hero. No real hero does, and all that. Blah blah blah...
There is nothing new here. In fact, everything in this book has been done in the past six volumes. You have the hunts through garages and stairwells. Check. A climactic conclusion involving Odd and numerous baddies, all occurring in a huge, sprawling mansion (circa Odd Apocalypse). Check. The search of an long abandoned location (Odd Thomas and Forever Odd). Storm Drains of Doom (Odd Hours and Odd Interlude). Some enigmatic old woman who just so happens to have a disposable handgun tucked away in her purse (no shit, didn't this same exact scene happen in Odd Hours?). The list goes on and on.
I'd say avoid this book like the plague, but if you like Odd Thomas (as I do) you'll read it, and, by the end, you might even like it. I just can't ignore all the stuff I mentioned simply because I find Odd Thomas one of the coolest, most endearing characters of my lifetime.
It's about quality, Mr. Koontz, not quantity. Slow down and give us stories worth our time and money.
