hard case crime – Pleasant Nights

Title: Later

Author: Stephen King

Genre: Paranormal Suspense

Stephen King now has three Hard Case Crime books. The first was Joyland, which was excellent. Next was The Colorado Kid, which was excellent. And now Later, which, you guessed it, is excellent. Later is a bit more like Joyland in the supernatural aspect, but it’s set in the modern day, which was a lot of fun for pop culture references.

From Goodreads: The son of a struggling single mother, Jamie Conklin just wants an ordinary childhood. But Jamie is no ordinary child. Born with an unnatural ability his mom urges him to keep secret, Jamie can see what no one else can see and learn what no one else can learn. But the cost of using this ability is higher than Jamie can imagine – as he discovers when an NYPD detective draws him into the pursuit of a killer who has threatened to strike from beyond the grave.

Later is Stephen King at his finest, a terrifying and touching story of innocence lost and the trials that test our sense of right and wrong. Later is a powerful, haunting, unforgettable exploration of what it takes to stand up to evil in all the faces it wears.

Jamie is such a fun character. He’s telling the story from the present but about his childhood, so you know his fate is fine, but along the way, some awful things happen. He warns us several times that this is a horror story. His secret is revealed pretty quickly in the book, but I won’t spoil it here. It’s such a bummer that King is penned into just being a “horror” writer, because he’s one of the best storytellers. Sure, his books are pretty terrifying, but his character and plot development is top notch. I can’t recommend him enough.

The Colorado Kid

Title: The Colorado Kid

Author: Stephen King

Genre: murder mystery

I read King’s other Hard Case Crime book Joyland last year and absolutely loved it. It was one of the best of his I’ve read in awhile. And now that his newest Hard Case book, Later, is out, I wanted to read The Colorado Kid. Hard Case Crime books are written by various authors you’re probably familiar with, and they all have pulpy, fun covers. I’ve only read King’s, but scrolling through the list, there are tons of others that I bet are great.

From Goodreads: On an island off the coast of Maine, a man is found dead. There’s no identification on the body. Only the dogged work of a pair of local newspapermen and a graduate student in forensics turns up any clues.

But that’s just the beginning of the mystery. Because the more they learn about the man and the baffling circumstances of his death, the less they understand. Was it an impossible crime? Or something stranger still…?

No one but Stephen King could tell this story about the darkness at the heart of the unknown and our compulsion to investigate the unexplained. With echoes of Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon and the work of Graham Greene, one of the world’s great storytellers presents a surprising tale that explores the nature of mystery itself…

Unlike most King’s books, this one isn’t scary at all. It’s just two old guys, who are adorable in their old man dynamics, telling a story. That’s it. A guy ended up dead on a beach, and, as reporters, these guys try to solve the mystery. He has no wallet, so they try to solve who he is and how he ended up on the beach. It’s a very simple story, but the dialogue between these two guys, who have been friends/co-workers for 40+ years, is like an old married couple. I listened to this one, and the narrator was spot on with the Maine accents. I loved this book and think it would easily appeal to non-King readers. Not scary. Not gross. Not even remotely horrifying. But still compelling.