Whathisname

Steven Weber, of Wings fame.

I actually have a shitload of cheap paperbacks of Dean Koontz stored on a closet shelf just about 18 inches from where I'm sitting typing right now, but I cheerfully concede that he's a horrid writer. He's generally a good gruesome twisty conspiracy-theory-ridden nutbag of a storyteller, and a big guilty pleasure, but there are whole chapters in each of his novels that I have to read with one eye closed or my brain turned off. When he decides to write like a real Writer and Ahh-tist, he's absolutely unbearable.

Stephen King will always have my utter hopeless loyalty for Insomnia, in which he quoted heavily from Stephen Dobyns's Cemetery Nights, one of my favorite books of poetry ever. I love him like mad for that.

Liked Crichton when I was a seventh grader.

King has so far failed to impress me, either with The Green Mile or The Gunslinger , and I thought both of them had interesting stories - just hated the way he told them.

Dean Koontz looks too bad for me to try it.

I've never gotten more than halfway through a Greg Bear novel without giving up - his ideas are cool, his writing drives me insane. Which is a shame, as he seems to have a lock on airport newsstands Sci-fi selections.

He's generally a good gruesome twisty conspiracy-theory-ridden nutbag of a storyteller, and a big guilty pleasure

Hee. Right there with you. I've read and liked a couple of his stories (no idea which ones; see above re: memory issues). And I remember picking up at least one that was unreadable. But, you know, I just didn't read it, and all was well.

(no idea which ones; see above re: memory issues).

Give me anything you remember, and I might be able to come up with titles.

OK, lemme see. I think there was one where the characters end up trapped in a building. I think that's one of the ones I liked. But I'm not sure. Then, did he write one about someone trying to track a serial killer, and the serial killer was somehow gaining ... I dunno, access? ... to the protaganist's mind ... or the other way around. (ETA: admittedly, both of the plot points described have no doubt been reproduced many times, so probably not all that helpful). And there was something about birds in the serial killer one. I think it all fell apart in the end, plot-wise. And I have no idea if it was actually Koontz.

But, then, I wouldn't put Koontz in the sci-fi category. (Random comment)

Thanks to the ABC miniseries, to this day I cannot bear to have the shower curtain closed unless someone is actually showering in it. If it's not in use, the curtain has to be all scrunched up at one end so that there's no possibility of anything lurking in the tub.

I found that you can buy clear plastic shower curtains at Wal-Mart and Kmart, and they usually have metal grommits to keep them from pulling through.

I think there was one where the characters end up trapped in a building. I think that's one of the ones I liked.

Okay, you got me there. I'm pretty sure characters frequently end up trapped in a building at some point. Sole Survivor, maybe?

Then, did he write one about someone trying to track a serial killer, and the serial killer was somehow gaining ... I dunno, access? ... to the protaganist's mind ... or the other way around. And there was something about birds. I think it all fell apart in the end, plot-wise.

Oh, I think that was Hideaway. That was the one where the guy has a near-death experience. Yeah, I think that's the one you're talking about.

One thing about that amused me about Koontz was his fascination with bougainvillaea. I have no idea what kind of flowers those are, but there are bougainvillaea in every single one of his books.

Well, it's interesting, Nova. Some books I read in seventh grade, I still like today. So I wouldn't necessarily consider that a strike against something. Hell, I still like the Narnia Chronicles, and I started those well before seventh grade. Just because I liked something when I was a juvenile doesn't mean I think the work was juvenile.

Which doesn't change the fact that your taste for the books in question changed, obviously. I'm just saying ... I liked it in seventh grade, and I still like it today is not an anomaly in my world. Is all.

(Edited for spelling, again. I'm having issues tonight.)

Oh, it's not a strike. It was a statement of support. Unlike King, I've enjoyed Crichton. Just...a long time ago.

Today, I bought three books at The Strand. All of them were aimed at people of approximately seventh grade. I'm a HUGE fan of things I read in the seventh grade - I had good taste!

My point was that Crichton is a fun read, but if I started him as late as I tried King, I might have been equally turned off. Or maybe not. That is all.

(Goes back to his pulpy novel about a sixteen-year-old hot sexy female werewolf that he got for $2...)