Book Review: The Husband

Book review: The Husband by Dean Koontz

I read my first Dean Koontz book when I was 16 after seeing Stephen King mention him in his book The Tommyknockers. I’ve been hooked ever since.

Unlike King, you never know what you’re going to get with Koontz. It could be a fast paced thriller, a poignant love story or a light-hearted comedy. Sometimes there are even a few clunkers; I can count on one hand the books I didn’t like by Koontz, but I suppose those are good odds considering the volume of his work.

Luckily, The Husband isn’t a clunker. It moves right along and grabs your attention up front. The only flaw is the patented Dean Koontz character ™. This is the character that is just too darn perfect to be a real person. They never get cranky or bad wind or throwing up drunk. They’re always gourmets and wine connoisseurs and never eat junk food unless forced (such as being chased by crazed killers). They have absolutely impeccable taste in clothes and decorating. The main character, Mitch Rafferty, is such a character. His only “flaw” of course is a virtue: he loves his wife so darn much that he’d just about lay down and die, right then and there if she was gone. So imagine how panicky he is when a total stranger calls him up and demands 2 million dollars for the safe return of his precious wife. He is a simple gardener and of course doesn’t have that kind of money. There is no question about going to the police, these people mean business, which they prove with a well-placed bullet.

After this, it’s pretty much non-stop, and with a twist halfway in that I totally didn’t see coming. The main theme of course is hope and unconditional love, even in the face of adversary and sometimes down-right evil. Giving up hope is not an option. Otherwise you might has well just... well, lay down and die right then and there. Despite his being perfect, Mitch is a likable character and you feel yourself actually worried for the guy at times. The Husband is a good read with an interesting story. Although not as deep as the Odd Thomas books, it still manages to convey it's message without being preachy or schmaltzy. An excellent read.

Rambling thoughts on Thankfulness

Thanksgiving, a purely secular holiday, is a time when we pause to reflect on all the things we are thankful for. This is impossible without acknowledging something or Someone other than ourselves for the things we appreciate in life. Being thankful is realizing a debt we owe, an act of humility. Humility is impossible without God.
In the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, after the reading of the Sacred Scriptures, we reply "Deo Gratias-Thanks Be to God" Thanks Be to Him Who humbled Himself out of love for His creatures to become one of these very same creatures! For just this act alone, we could never Thank Him enough, but He still wanted to prove to us the depth of His love by Redeeming us with His own Precious Blood. And still He wasn't finished. In order to be completely and utterly united with us, He gave His very own Flesh to be our Food, so that we could be intimately united with Him everyday if we so wished: Eucharist, which means "Thanksgiving". Every time we receive Our Lord in Holy Communion we should be making a profound act of Thanksgiving.
"Thank You O Lord, for these Thy gifts, which we are about to receive from Thy bounty" ~Traditional Prayer before Meals

Too many blogs

I have 2 blogs: this one and the one over at Yahoo! 360 . I barely keep up with either one. There must be some way to merge the two, so if I update one the other is automatically updated. The thing is, I'm such a complete and total idiot when it comes to computers and things like that. I guess I can always copy/paste. I know how to do that at least.