Comic Suspense

Comic Suspense Abounds in Koontz Novels

Dean Koontz is considered one of America's best suspense novelists, but his skill as a comedic writer is sometimes overlooked. No other author mixes a cocktail of page-turning suspense with the paper umbrella of perfect comic timing quite the way Dean Koontz does. Ready for a thrill ride that will make you laugh AND cry, check out the following list of some of our favorite comic suspense novels.

FROM THE CORNER OF HIS EYE Bartholomew Lampion is born on a day of tragedy and terror that will mark his family forever. On this same day, a thousand miles away, a ruthless man learns that he has a mortal enemy named Bartholomew. He embarks on a relentless search to find this enemy. What happens to Bartholomew as his amazing life unfolds and entwines with others results in a breathtaking journey of courage, heart-stopping suspense, and high adventure. Click here to read more.

ONE DOOR AWAY FROM HEAVEN ONE DOOR AWAY FROM HEAVEN is an incandescent mix of suspense and humor, fear and wonder, a story of redemption and timeless wisdom that will have readers cheering for Michelina Bellsong as she embarks on a remarkable quest that will change everything she knows—or thinks she knows--forever. Click here to read more.

ODD THOMAS ODD THOMAS, who can see the lingering dead, thinks of himself as an ordinary guy. Maybe he has a gift, maybe it's a curse, Odd has never been sure, but he tries to do his best by the silent souls who seek him out. One of the lingering spirits who frequently interacts with Odd is Elvis, still pining for his long-dead mother. Elvis' spirit adds just the right touch of comic relief to this action-packed suspense story. Click here to read more.

BROTHER ODD Dean Koontz's third Odd Thomas novel (after Forever Odd) is an irresistibly offbeat mix of supernatural horror and laugh-out-loud humor. St. Bartholomew's Abbey sits in majestic solitude amid the wild peaks of California's high Sierra, a sanctuary for those seeking insight. Odd Thomas has come here to learn to live fully again, and among the eccentric monks, their other guests, and the nuns and young students of the attached convent school, he has begun to find his way. With the silent spirits of the bell-ringing Brother Constantine and the King of Rock 'n' Roll by his side, Odd Thomas is stalking spirits of an infinitely darker nature.... Click here to read more.

THE FACE Enter a world of marvelous invention, enchantment, and implacable intent, populated by murderous actors and the walking dead, hit men and heroes, long-buried dreams and never-dying hope. A riveting tour de force of suspense, mystery, and miraculous revelation, The Face is that rare novel that entertains, provokes, and uplifts at the same time. It will make you laugh. It will give you chills. It will fill you with hope. Click here to read more.

LIFE EXPECTANCY Suspense that's buoyed steadily by humor, even as it deals with the most desperate of circumstances, is nearly impossible to sustain—but not for Dean Koontz. On the day Jimmy Tock, a pastry chef in a Colorado resort town, was born, Jimmy's dying grandfather predicted five future dates that would be terrible for Jimmy. That same day, a bitter, deranged circus clown committed multiple murders in the hospital. Twenty years later, when the vengeful son of that clown takes Jimmy and a beautiful young woman, Lorrie Hicks, hostage in the local library, Jimmy falls in love. He and Lorrie survive and marry, but will they survive the four subsequent terrible days? Click here to read more.

TICKTOCK Tommy Phan is a successful detective novelist, living the American Dream in southern California. One evening he comes home to find a small rag doll on his doorstep. It's a simple doll, covered entirely in white cloth, with crossed black stitches for the eyes and mouth, and another pair forming an X over the heart. Something terrifying emerges from the pristine white cloth, something that will follow Tommy wherever he goes. Something he can't destroy. It wants Tommy's life and he doesn't know why. And he only has until dawn to figure out the answer. Click here to read more.

FOREVER ODD We're all a little odd beneath the surface. But there's so much more to any of us than meets the eye — and that goes triple for Odd Thomas. Odd lives between two worlds in the small desert town of Pico Mundo, where the heroic and the harrowing are everyday events. As the unofficial ambassador between our world and the world of the lingering dead, he's got a duty to do the right thing. That's the way Odd sees it and that's why he's won hearts on both sides of the divide between life and death. Click here to read more.

BY THE LIGHT OF THE MOON Dylan O'Connor is a gifted young artist just trying to do the right thing in life. He's on his way to an arts festival in Santa Fe when he stops to get a room for himself and his twenty-year-old autistic brother, Shep. But in a nightmarish instant, Dylan is attacked by a mysterious "doctor," injected with a strange substance that will either kill him...or transform his life in the most remarkable way. Then he is told that he must flee before the doctor's enemies hunt him down for the secret circulating through his body. Click here to read more.

FEAR NOTHING Christopher Snow is the best-known resident of 12,000-strong Moonlight Bay, California. This is because 28-year-old Chris has xeroderma pigmentosum (XP)–a light-sensitivity so severe that he cannot leave his house in daylight, cannot enter a normally-lit room, cannot sit at a computer. Chris's natural element is the night. When his parents die, Chris's protected life changes forever. Chris will find out that he has the soul of a fighter and an adventurer. He is stalked by shadowy characters who want him to stop his search for answers or they'll kill his supersmart, beer-lapping dog Orson; his best surfing buddy Bobby; and his late-night deejay girlfriend Sasha. By the end of the book he will realize that some people hate him, others revere him, and neither his own life nor those of anyone he knows will ever be the same. Click here to read more.

SEIZE THE NIGHT At no time does Moonlight Bay look more beautiful than at night. Yet it is precisely then that the secluded little town reveals its menace. Now children are disappearing. From their homes. From the streets. And there's nothing their families can do about it. Because in Moonlight Bay, the police work their hardest to conceal crimes and silence victims. Christopher Snow isn't afraid of the dark. Forced to live in the shadows because of a rare genetic disorder, he knows the night world better than anyone. To uncover the root of the town's terror, Chris must confront an adversary at one with the most dangerous darkness of all. The darkness inside the human heart. Click here to read more.