When he and his widowed mother are threatened by a freakish killer, a brilliant 11-year-old boy on the autism spectrum teams with an orphaned dog with human intelligence to fight off evil.The boy, Woody, hasn't spoken a word in his life but has created a sophisticated virtual world to escape to and can hack the most complex dark web networks. He's determined to avenge his researcher father, who died in a suspicious helicopter crash. The dog, Kipp, orphaned by the death of his aged, loving caretaker, is part of an underground canine network boasting many other similarly advanced, genetically engineered dogs. (These dogs, who call themselves the Mysterium, are capable of such miracles as retrieving books from the library and reading them at night.) Out of the blue, a man who once worked with Woody's father and briefly dated Megan, Woody's mother, propositions and then threatens her. "I am becoming the king of beasts," he boasts, after having bitten a young woman to death. There is certainly no lack of raw action in the book, Koontz's first following five novels featuring investigator Jane Hawk. It just takes a certain kind of reader to...swallow the plot. Depending on one's susceptibility to heart-tugging boy-and-dog tales, the novel will either be dismissed as a work of cloying commercial calculation or enjoyed as a crafty blend of genres. The worst fear raised by this odd creature feature is that it will spawn a sequel. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Readers who were wondering how Koontz could possibly follow up his remarkable Jane Hawk series can breathe a sigh of relief. His new novel finds him still at the top of his game. Koontz taps into one of literature's oldest themes, the monster versus the innocents. Here the monster is a very sick man, and the innocents are an autistic boy, his mother, and a gifted dog. Adroitly mixing elements of SF and horror, Koontz has crafted a memorable and frightening antagonist in Lee Shacket, a corporate CEO desperate to cover up a horrible accident. Out of a craving for revenge against the woman who scorned him years earlier he blames her for pretty much all his recent travails Shacket turns from a man with a murderous grudge into a monster who commits acts of unspeakable violence. Megan Bookman, the object of Shacket's obsession, is a familiar Koontz hero, an ordinary person who draws on hidden reserves of strength. Of her son, Woody, and the very special dog, Kipp, the less said, the better: Koontz has secrets to reveal about them, and they won't be spoiled here. Scary, sickening (in that good way), and touching, this is a novel that will delight both the author's legion of fans and those who finally decide it's time to find out what this guy Koontz is all about.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Koontz is a master of popular fiction across genres, and a new novel with his name on it is guaranteed to leapfrog to the top of best-seller lists everywhere.--David Pitt Copyright 2020 Booklist