Rating: 
Summary: the story continues
Review: I would suggest reading the first of Christopher Snow's adventures "Fear Nothing" before you read this one. They are both fast-paced and exciting reads with the usual Dean Koontz trademark humor. The ending leaves you kind of hanging but Koontz promises us a third sometime in 2002. I can't wait to see what happens next!
Rating: 
Summary: A great plot with not neccesary a great ending
Review: I bought the book while on business travel and didn't have a chance to start reading it until last week. My overall impression is that, as always, Dean Koontz is a master in creating plots that are destined to be suspense masterpieces. The first 3/4 of the book are entertaining although at times very repetitive. The last 1/4 of the book seemed to me as if having been written with the urgent need to deliver the work and not really continuing the initial creative process. I did not like the way in which the ending was managed, although the rest of the plot and its development was superb!The book left me with two unanswered questions: - Was a "nuke" released? and if so when did Snow get a chance to write the "memories"? My advise: Read this book as a quick pastime. Don't take it too seriously or you may be dissapointed with the ending. Still, worth the time spent. I had a lot of fun with the suspense.
Rating:
Summary: Hmmmmm....
Review: This book is like any other books I've read, not bad. The plot of this book is interesting though. It starts how how all these kids get kidnapped, and this man with a disease called XP tries to find them. Then he uncovers this huge secret that went on a few years back at this place called Fort Wyvern, before it closed down after a tragic accident. I give this book four stars because it deserves it.
Rating:
Summary: Unbelievable step for Dean Koontz
Review: Throughout this book I was enthralled with Christopher Snow and all of his adventures. This book was the one that made me a Koontz follower for life. Even now, 2 years later, I can't help but wonder when Christopher Snow and his friends will finish off the possible horrors from an old closed down military base. Be carefull when you open this book-you won't put it down until it's done.
Rating: 
Summary: Fair
Review: If you only read one book this year...don't make this one it. If you're a high volume reader as I am, it may be worth a day's time. The story is interesting, however Koontz's tendency to overload the book with symbolism, and repeat it uneccessarily to remind the readers (and perhaps himself). ... Besides being unecessarily long winded, the book contains impossible dialogue. The use of surfer terminology makes the serious tone of the book more flippant. Not only that, but the paragraph of definition after the use of terms only adds to the amount of chaff on the page. The story was imaginitive, but didn't move fast enough for me. The pace was erratic. The ending was too thrown together. The beginning states "If you are reading this, that means the world has come to an end," Yet, the characters "live happily ever after" as it were. The author takes the time to belabour the ending with many instances of holes in the plot, and dismisses them as "paradox." This confuses the reader... I thought it was interesting, and a good read, but not worth a second look. I did love Koontz's "Watchers" and suggest that instead. I do suggest buying all of your novels used from individuals selling on amazon.com...A WONDERFUL buying experience!
Rating:
Summary: Great Read
Review: I picked this book up at some cheap book sale somewhere and its the best couple of dollars I've ever spent. Koontz has never really been my style but this book had me so caught up I read it in two nights. Admittedly some of the langueage spoken by two of the main characters can get a bit annoying, especially if you don't really understand it!! But never the less the overall plot of conspiracies and genetics always get me hooked. The one thing I did really like about this book, is that it kept you guessing right till the last page, most books I read I can already guess the plot and finish before I'm half way through but this one was fabulous. The main character is Christopher Snow, who has a genetic disorder of XP meaning he can only stay in the darkness, he's quite an interesting person with what seems to be some pretty weird insight into the world around us. Then we have Bobby, Chris's best friend, who is one of those typical laid back surfers, whose whole life revolves around surfing and friends, Lastly there is Sasha, Chris's present live in girlfriend, playing the typical mysterious, pretty and arty girlfriend. Of course I should here mention Orson who is another major player, a super intelligent dog, who was given to Chris by his deceased mother, is essentially the reason the whole plot took place!! Between these three and of course the dog, the storyline centres around the save the world from itself type thing, but with many twists and turns along the way. There's a bit of action, love, drama, medical mystery, science fiction and a great moral underlying to it. I would strongly reccommend this book to anyone.
Rating:
Summary: This one is way out there.
Review: I didn't enjoy this book as much as some of Dean Koontz's other books. Though his writing style is still very much Koontz, the plot is bizarre, and not in a good way. The story centers around Christopher Snow, a man who is living on borrowed time because he has a rare disease called xeroderma pigmentosum. He is one in 1000 people in the world with this disease, which causes extreme sensitivity to light, any kind of light, and so the darkness is his world. Any contact with light puts him at great risk of all kinds of malignancies. His friend Lilly's son has been abducted, and Chris sets out to pursue the kidnapper. With a few chosen friends that are every bit as odd as Chris is, they begin to unravel a mystery that happened in their little town of Moonlight Bay, a mystery so profound that it can change the course of life as we know it. Chris's dead mother had been involved in genetic experimenting, and one of the retroviruses she isolated escaped. The results are frightening, and if Mr. Koontz had not gotten highly technical, I would not have been able to put the book down. I loved his descriptions of Wyvern, or "Dead Town" as Chris refers to it. It is the birthplace of the retrovirus, and the center of the story's evil. Not all that came out of Dead Town is horrible. Chris' dog, Orson, was given to him by his mother, an experiment in intelligence, and indeed Orson is a highly intelligent Labrador mix that will have you rooting him on. A cat name Mungojerrie also helps decipher, and plays a leading role in the story's ending. Mungojerrie is also equipped with more than usual intelligence. I enjoyed the way Chris and his friends talked in short monosyllables to each other, with their favorite lingo, it added closeness to the characters. I found myself losing interest only at the times Mr. Koontz tried to elaborate on the technical aspects of what was happening in Dead Town. The story left me with an eerie feeling, but not creepy enough to read it again.
Rating:
Summary: Fine Language, Only Nice Plot
Review: From my point of view this book deserves five stars for style & writing, while character description/development gets 4, story + plot only 3. That gets me to an average of 4 stars, but only because you can give it a 3 and a half. The book is absolutely thriling, gripping seizing, a page-turner, but the plot is just to exaggerated and in the end gets really dumb, because there are too much coincidences, just a lot of action laid out during the whole book and in the end desperately tried to put in context with the general story. This book reads like a good action-movie, but like every action movie this book lacks of brains - whole lot of a pity, because I liked the characters, I could feel with Chris Snow, feel his love for his girl friend and Orson his dog, experience the friendship with Bobby, etc., but the story is even for a work of fiction too capillotract and unrealistic. The general idea of the book is good, although that there are two different ideas, two different books all put together, compressed into 400 pages or something. There's the crime story with the serial kid-napper - with all it's side-stories and occurrences a story for itself, featuring all the charcters. Then you got the sci-fi novel, about the Mystery Train Project, Snow's Mother, her death and so on. Again you got all the characters, again you got a book for itself. Unfortunately Koontz tries to connects these to plots - this might sound pretty much sophisticated for most of us: wow, popular writer, a real genius, know what, chuck, he got two different stories and - know what? - in the end it all fits together! Well it's together in the end - you get it all in the big, ponderous finale, the kid-napper & and the horror of the mysterious Mystery Train, there you get the whole fix - but that's not the problem. The problem is, that these two stories, although brought together, don't fit. It's that simple. Looked at in that perspective, Koontz' "Seize the Night" seems like the work of a pretty bad wannabe-writer - if not for his absolutely likable characters and his astounding words, that glitter like a golden spark of silver in the moonlight. Maybe you can seize the night after all, with your bedlamp turned on brightly, the book unfolded on your lap, windows closed, doors locked. If you stick to the prose you can't do much harm with this book. It will entertain you until page 200, then it will make you angry about the dumb ending, in between you'll find some chills and scares, not cheap but valuable.
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Summary: Truth is stranger than fiction.
Review: This was my first Koontz book, and I loved it. Admittedly, I am a reader who gravitates toward alternative books, those who don't quite make it to the popular mainstream. Thus, my late acquaintance of Mr. Koontz. Silly me. Once again I am reverting to my quaint habit of listening to audio books as I weed in my garden. I started this one last summer, summer ended, as did the weeding, and I put it away, unfinished. I picked it up again first thing this summer, and started over, delightedly reminded of the intrigue that had held me quite rapt last summer. I didn't mind starting at the beginning again at all. Now, what intrigues me about this book is how believable it is, and how it dovetails so nicely with the poli-sci reading that I *do* do. It's more realistic than you might think. More horrendous than you would want to think realistic. Koontz knows something, and he's telling it the only way he thinks he can get it across. For those who dismiss what he has to say as pure fiction, well, do your homework. Even more than that, though, is Koontz's delightful way of turning a phrase, painting a picture with his words, making knowledgeable references to time and place and culture that most, if not all of us can relate to. More than once I smiled and even giggled as he captured an image with a brilliant metaphor. The man is good. He's very good. And yes, I'll read more by him. The point I want to make, though, is that if you are in the habit of following my reading and my reviews, this one fits right in. You might not think so, but check it out. You will be amazed. I know I was. ...geminiwalker
Rating:
Summary: Get to the point, man
Review: This was the second Dean Koontz novel that I've heard/read in recent years. The first was "Fear Nothing." I enjoyed both books, especially the characters, despite an annoying flaw: Koontz can't seem to get to the point at times. I loved Christopher Snow and his relationships with his friends and the night. But Koontz gives "page turner" new meaning. I found myself skipping ahead to get past some seemingly endless descriptions apparently intended to build suspense. I'll pay just as much for a shorter book, Dean.
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