Finders Keepers by Stephen King

Title: Finders Keepers
Author:  Stephen King
Series: Bill Hodges Triology #2
Publish Date: June 2, 2015
Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Publisher’s Description: “Wake up, genius.” So begins King’s instantly riveting story about a vengeful reader. The genius is John Rothstein, an iconic author who created a famous character, Jimmy Gold, but who hasn’t published a book for decades. Morris Bellamy is livid, not just because Rothstein has stopped providing books, but because the nonconformist Jimmy Gold has sold out for a career in advertising. Morris kills Rothstein and empties his safe of cash, yes, but the real treasure is a trove of notebooks containing at least one more Gold novel.

Morris hides the money and the notebooks, and then he is locked away for another crime. Decades later, a boy named Pete Saubers finds the treasure, and now it is Pete and his family that Bill Hodges, Holly Gibney, and Jerome Robinson must rescue from the ever-more deranged and vengeful Morris when he’s released from prison after thirty-five years.

Not since Misery has King played with the notion of a reader whose obsession with a writer gets dangerous. Finders Keepers is spectacular, heart-pounding suspense, but it is also King writing about how literature shapes a life—for good, for bad, forever.

Possible spoilers beyond this point.

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I truly can’t get enough of Stephen King’s writing. Finders Keepers is another of his marvels, which is the second in the Bill Hodges Trilogy. If you remember Bill Hodges from King’s Mr. Mercedes, in which we are introduced to a hard-boiled detective story outside of King’s norm of horror. Although Finders Keepers stays with the non-horror, it has a different kind of creepiness that is just as mesmerizing as his standard themes.

I do wonder at the recurring themes of “crazy” men are created by “crazy” mothers and writing, especially fiction, can take on a life of its own that fans see as more real than their own lives. Is King drawing from his own experience or does he just like exploring these avenues?

This was also the first book I’ve “read” with the audio to e-reader and back option. I started listening to it and Will Patten is SUCH a good narrator and kept riveted, but when I was in a situation where I couldn’t listen, but could read, I was pleased at how easy the switch was. By then, I was so lured into the story, that I finished it in one sitting.

Stephen King’s gift is to ratchet up the tension, suck you into the craziness of people’s beliefs and perceptions and then bring it home with an ending so satisfying. The book hangover is in full effect with Finders Keepers. I still haven’t picked my next book! I give it a 5 and can’t wait for the final installment of the Bill Hodges Trilogy!!

Other reviews…

• New York Times
• NPR Books

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