Reviews with content warning for Homophobia - Quien pierde paga

as someone who prefers king's more monstrous stories to what i would call regular thrillers, i found the story underwhelming. a kid finds a murderer's stash of money and manuscripts the latter stole from a famous author and uses the money to help his own family out of debt. the murderer gets out of prison and wants it back. a surprisingly standard story without any of the weird twists you'd expect from the author - the antag feels very much like an everyday bad guy without the horrifying impact of king's previous villains. about halfway through i realized i was supremely bored and struggled to get through 10 pages in one sitting before forcing myself to finish as quickly as possible.
3 stars because as always king has a very appealing writing style and strong voice, and i wouldn't say it's a bad book, just forgettable in my eyes compared to his other works.

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trash_reader_'s review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

This book was so definitely better than the first one. I was hooked from page 1. There wasn't a single moment where I wasn't drawn into the action.

This book will probably be my favorite of the trilogy, and that's mostly because it involves books. I love books and in a twisted sort of way I understand Morris's obsessive need to get his hands on the notebooks. Literature can change your life. And when you've had nothing to think about for 36 years than literature, I can understand becoming obsessive to the point of murdering for it.

I don't like where Stephen King is going with Brady, though. If he's doing what I think he's doing with the telekinesis thing, I'm going to be very disappointed. The biggest draw to this series for me was the real-life aspect of it. I love realistic, contemporary thrillers because it draws me in more. Brady developing telekinetic powers because Holly whapped him hard enough in the first book does not follow that theme at all.

I'm excited to see what King did for the third novel, but I'm also a little apprehensive now.

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imre_karakal's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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ripxw's review against another edition

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challenging dark medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.75

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