Watchers, by Dean Koontz
I’m sure I read this 30 years ago, but it was chosen as a book club pick for May, so I gave it a fresh read. The thing of it is, unless I have read a book multiple times, I forget them, so it was like a brand new book!
Travis, a well-off widower goes out hiking in hills of southern California to get himself out of his head and ease his depression. While there, he finds a Golden Retriever, who looks lost. The retriever seems scared, and concerned about the crashing noise in the bushes that is coming closer, so Travis hurries back to his car with the dog and they leave.
Nora is learning to reclaim her life after spending nearly all of it locked up in the home of her reclusive aunt, who instills Nora with a pressing fear of the outside world. Her fears are proven when a TV repairman comes to the house and begins to stalk her.
A chance meeting between Travis and Nora is cemented by the dog, now named Einstein, and the two of them quickly realize that Einstein is no ordinary dog. He is a genius. But how? When they learn that he has escaped from a research lab, and that another, extremely dangerous creature has escaped as well, they embark on a journey to keep themselves and Einstein safe both from the creature and the government agents who are searching for the dog. Throw in an assassin hired by the Russians, who has become obsessed with finding them as a side project, and you have quite the thriller!
The book is formulaic and predictable, and the characters are pretty one-dimensional. This isn’t going to be the book that wins the National Book Award or the Pulitzer. But it held my interest with its twists and turns, and will appeal to those who like a little romance with their sci-fi thriller. That said, it really irritated me that they kept feeding that poor dog chocolate! You would think if the author is going to write a book about a dog, he should at least know that chocolate is poisonous to dogs.
And no, I’m not going to give away whether the dog lives.
3 stars.
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