I picked this book up from the library mainly because it is the story of a woman who helps rescue Golden Retrievers. I personally got involved with Labrador rescue recently when my husband and I adopted a three-year-old Labrador, so of course I had to read the book.
The story interested me, but it was hard to read in part because unfortunately too many dogs are abused in puppy mills and Koontz goes into great detail about them and how they work, yuck. At one point, when he talked about putting a dog to sleep, I cried. I had to do it too often and it was a reminder that dogs don’t live long enough. There was also a long thread about the abuse of a disabled child with Down syndrome that made me sick to my stomach, very difficult to read. Well, Koontz IS a horror writer.
I enjoyed Darkest Evening for the most part. The story was told from various points of view, by seemingly unrelated people. It was interesting to see how Koontz wove all the disparate threads together towards the end of the book. However, the ending didn’t work for me, or for many people who reviewed the book on amazon.com. It almost seemed like Koontz got to a certain point, looked at his watch and said, “Snot, I have to finish this!”, and he did.
There is a huge element of woo-woo in this book, so be prepared. Nickie the Golden Retriever who appears at the beginning of the book may or may not have the spirit of a previous dog or person. I think the dogs were more complete and interesting characters than the people who seem like caricatures to me. Once again, the women were beautiful and the men handsome, the supporting characters witty and wealthy. Give me a break.
Despite the dark element of this novel, there are some very funny laugh-out-loud lines in the book. The humor is a nice counterweight to all the horror. I loved reading about Goldens, although I am a Labrador Retriever lover. I’ve lived with dogs long enough to know that they each have their own unique personalities and fun little quirks.
Many of Koontz’s books are very long, partly I think because he LOVES to describe! It’s good at it, but often it’s too much, it makes my teeth hurt. This book had so many lush descriptions, and I often got lost in it all and had to go back to see what was happening to people! Unlike some of his longer tomes, this one is a more normal 354 pages long. All in all, I guess I’d have to say I didn’t love it and I didn’t hate it, but I did finish the book and that’s something I don’t always do.
