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Mr. Mercedes

Stephen King

In the predawn hours, in a distressed American city, hundreds of unemployed men and women line up for the opening of a job fair. They are tired and cold and desperate. Emerging from the fog, invisible until it is too late, a lone driver plows through the crowd in a stolen Mercedes, running over the innocent, backing up, and charging again. Eight people are killed; fifteen are wounded. The killer escapes.

Months later, an ex-cop named bill Hodges, still haunted by the unsolved crime, contemplates suicide. When he gets …

In the predawn hours, in a distressed American city, hundreds of unemployed men and women line up for the opening of a job fair. They are tired and cold and desperate. Emerging from the fog, invisible until it is too late, a lone driver plows through the crowd in a stolen Mercedes, running over the innocent, backing up, and charging again. Eight people are killed; fifteen are wounded. The killer escapes.

Months later, an ex-cop named bill Hodges, still haunted by the unsolved crime, contemplates suicide. When he gets a crazed letter from "the perk," claiming credit for the murders, Hodges wakes up from his depressed and vacant retirement, fearing another even more diabolical attack and hell-bent on preventing it.

Brady Hartfield lives with his alcoholic mother in the house where he was born. He loved the feel of death under the wheels of the Mercedes, and he wants that rush again. Only Bill Hodges, with a couple of eccentric and mismatched allies, can apprehend the killer before he strikes again. And they have no time to lose, because Brady's next mission, if it succeeds, will kill or maim thousands.

Mr. Mercedes is a war between good and evil from the master of suspense whose insight into the mind of this obsessed, insane killer is chilling and unforgettable. --front flap

Hardcover

English language

Published Jan. 30, 2014 by Scribner.

ISBN:: 978-1-4767-5445-1
Copied ISBN!
OCLC Number:: 972133511

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Reviews

Kadomi@buecher.pnpde.social reviewed Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King

The hunt for a killer

4.0 stars

If I look back at all the books I have read in my life, I think I can say with confidence that Stephen King is my most-read author. Some of his works make me kinda cringe a bit now, but all in all, I just love his writing. Over the years, he's been branching out into many genres, away from just being a horror writer, and Mr. Mercedes is crime fiction, not horror. Sometimes it didn't even have that feeling of a Stephen King novel.

All in all, I really enjoyed it. Bill Hodges is an overweight, retired police detective who's in his 60s and struggles to find a reason to live. In comes Mr. Mercedes, a killer he was never able to catch in his active time, who ran a Mercedes sedan into a crowd, killing many people. Mr. Mercedes is trying to taunt Hodges into committing suicide. …

If I look back at all the books I have read in my life, I think I can say with confidence that Stephen King is my most-read author. Some of his works make me kinda cringe a bit now, but all in all, I just love his writing. Over the years, he's been branching out into many genres, away from just being a horror writer, and Mr. Mercedes is crime fiction, not horror. Sometimes it didn't even have that feeling of a Stephen King novel.

All in all, I really enjoyed it. Bill Hodges is an overweight, retired police detective who's in his 60s and struggles to find a reason to live. In comes Mr. Mercedes, a killer he was never able to catch in his active time, who ran a Mercedes sedan into a crowd, killing many people. Mr. Mercedes is trying to taunt Hodges into committing suicide. Little does he know that this will kick Hodges back into gear, as he renews his efforts to find Mr. Mercedes.

The novel reads as a back and forth. We early on get the PoV from the killer, who is a young man with a somewhat disturbing relationship to his alcoholic mother, and get to experience how his life gets more and more out of control. It is a bit of a nailbiter at the end there.

As mentioned above, I really liked it. I liked the cast, especially the highly unlikely 'investigator' Holly, a neurotypical woman in her 40s, Hodges' young helper Jerome, etc. Looking forward to reading the two next books, plus Holly, King's most recent book.

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