Watchers by Dean Koontz

Watchers by Dean Koontz
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Dean Koontz was one of my favourite writers for a couple of decades, and Watchers was one of my favourite books - hence the old 5-star rating. Heck, I've had several print copies of this book (including a replacement for the copy my dog ate), so that I could share the magic with friends.

It's almost 20 years later, and upon a re-read, the problematic aspects of the book are far more obvious, the storyline isn't as engaging, the characters are rather flat (Nora's a bit of a bore, though the utterly obnoxious handyman sounded a little too realistic for my liking, based on social media interactions), the situations are seriously dated (they made sense almost 20 years ago, but need some serious updating).

But then, who cares about the human characters when there's Einstein and The Outsider? Einstein! World's smartest dog! The book does do a decent job of showing exactly why The Outsider hates itself - and Einstein - so much. There's no subtlety in the depictions of how "normies" view "others", although amped up to a degree that makes The Outsider more than just different and actually malevolent - albeit sympathetic in the final climactic scene.

So, for Einstein and The Outsider, the five stars remain, even though the book is just no longer my cup of tea; my tastes have changed and that's okay. This book was great for what it was, when it was written; viewed through today's lens, it's nowhere close to as impactful, but I won't throw away my well-read copy because it still speaks to some of the best times of my life.

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