The Taking
by Dean Koontz
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Book Summary Information
Author: Dean KoontzEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2005-04-26
ISBN: 0553584502
Number of pages: 448
Publisher: Bantam
Book Reviews of The Taking
Book Review: "Not With A Bang, But a Whimper..."
Summary: 3 Stars
Using that line of poetry from T.S. Eliot's "The Hollow Men" is an appropriate way to describe Dean Koontz's ambitious end-of-the-world novel for many reasons. His borrowing of Eliot's work as a sort of theme for the story was one of many interesting stylistic quirks in "The Taking". Truth be told, the references piqued my interest in poetry at first, but quickly became trite as they were repeated page after page in a way that strikes me as more self-indulgent than necessary to plot or character development.
When I first started reading this novel, I was absolutely intrigued. I know Koontz's prose has been considered pretentious, but I found the poetic style to be artistic. It's refreshing to know that some current authors actually HAVE a large literary vocabulary.
Where things began to go wrong for me was when Molly's past was elaborated on. It felt forced, more like a soap opera script that was thrown in to add "depth" to the character. Instead the story of her childhood abuse (including a scene where she guns down her abusive father in her grade school classroom) distracts from the fascinating end of the world scenario and doesn't add anything to her rather bland character.
The middle of the book lacks the eerie sense of uncertainty and doom that makes the start so riveting. We get a better sense of the aliens who have invaded the Earth and have caused the bizarre and deadly weather patterns. Death and destruction is detailed in almost every page. Some of the imagery is quite gruesome and imaginative. The scene with the doll that comes to life and threatens the survivors is downright disturbing.
If "The Taking" starts with a bang, it progressively fizzles out into a whimper by the final chapters. It ends with what must be literally the most blatant example of deus ex machina of all time. (I won't spoil it here.) The final pages of the book slips into Koontz's philosophical views about the nature of humanity. The novel which I had enjoyed so thoroughly in the early chapters had regressed into a lecture about Christianity. After such a promising beginning, I slammed shut "The Taking" feeling annoyed. Why do so many religious people insist that the only explanation for the unexplainable is that God or the Devil is behind it? The world is not so simply black-or-white. It bothered me that Koontz tacked on biblical babble to the end of this book in order to wrap things up. It felt cheap after all the talk of the possibilities of other worlds and phenomenon beyond human understanding to fall back on the Bible.
Do the good points of "The Taking" balance out the negative ones? I suppose that would be up to the individual reader to decide. I can't recommend this book, but if you need something to skim over on a long flight, I'm not going to disuade you from it entirely. Just check it out from the library to save yourself money and keep your expectations low.
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