Holly (Holly Gibney, #3)

Review

I've returned to Goodreads after a long hiatus specifically to rate this book, which I thought was vaguely entertaining (I finished it, after all!) but regularly frustrated the hell out of me. It's hard for me to say what exactly annoyed me so much about this book. Sure, the dialogue was pretty bad* at points, but I've enjoyed plenty of novels with bad dialogue. Did I think the constant Covid references and characters asking each other if they were vaccinated was a little tiresome? Potentially, but I think it's a hard topic to deal with in a novel and it did bring out some interesting character nuances. Even the sometimes lackadaisical pacing could have been counterbalanced by the strong points of the story—typical King stuff like fun villains, gruesome body horror, and interesting side characters. With some reflection, though, I think there were two main issues that led to this book leaving such a sour taste in my mouth. The first was that the whole book felt weirdly self-congratulatory. I found the side plots about the two Robinson children's writing endeavors, for example, to be mostly gratuitous and a little too starry-eyed. It was jarring to read about some of the horrors in store for the side characters while the two largely irrelevant side plots were about the Robinsons stacking up wins as young writers. Even making them both turn into writers seems self-indulgent! To me, it feels like King really loves these characters and expects us to love them the same way, but even though I've read most of the books in the Gibney-verse and enjoy the general lineup, I would much rather those characters had believable, interesting storylines than the ones we get in this book. The second thing that bothered me about this book was that it had an almost complete lack of suspense. I can understand the impulse to make a bold choice like revealing the villains and some of their motives early on in the story, but I think if you do that, you have to add some suspense later, and I didn't think that came through at all. The plot armor of all the main characters felt strong enough that even when Holly was staring death in the face, I didn't have any fear that she would come out of it much the worse for wear. I suppose the second point, then, is really more of a function of the first—it's hard to maintain a sense of energy and suspense when you're going off on constant digressions about characters who aren't really involved in the story! Anyway, I worry a little that I'm not being fair to Mr. King. This is a fine book with some good pieces, it just doesn't hold a candle (in my little opinion) to some of his other recent work like The Outsider or The Institute. * Bad dialogue reproduced here: "Not that I saw," Herrera says,... "And I believe I would have. Convenience stores like this, especially on quiet streets like Red Bank Ave, are prime targets for robbers. Although this place has never been hit, grace of God."