I loved this book!! Great story!! 1st time reading this author!! will read more of his books!!

Typical John Saul...one-dimensional characters, little to like about anyone, but a fast-paced plot. I really disliked the end and felt he explained, rather than let the characters discover the major plot hook. Also two character deaths did not add to the suspense and were instead a great disappointment. A read that kept me entertained, but a disappointing ending.

MaryAnne Carpenter gets a phone call informing her that her good friend Audrey Wilkenson and her husband Ted are dead. MaryAnne has been named the guardian of their only son, Joey. So MaryAnne travels to the Wilkenson’s ranch home in Sugarloaf, Idaho, with her two young children (Logan and Alison) and her husband, Alan. MaryAnne is having trouble with Joey, who goes out a lot at night in the forest. Then, some campers are brutally murdered. Sometimes MaryAnne feels like they are being watched. Should she stay at the ranch or go back home? This story was interesting and captivating at times, but I just didn’t enjoy this book as much as other books I’ve read by this author. I found Joey to be an unlikable and annoying character and I didn’t really like his backstory with the mountain man, etc. A so-so read.

Guardian opened as a book with few obvious predictions. Husband wife separation due to husband infidelity...in another scene, overly strict father reprimanding young son.. but then twists arise, and now the predictable becomes the unpredictable. It’s one of those books you want to read quickly but you can’t. While it’s not a complete page turner it is when you can get into the scenes. It took a while for the author to expose the perpetrator (toward the end of the book) and more surprising were the character eliminations. On a scale of 1-5 I found my interest with the storyline a 2, which is why it took me longer to read. It left me slightly bored. I gave it a 3 because the story got better the last few chapters.

This is about a paragraph from Guardian 13 John Saul chapter 9. Alison was staring at the ground now, and Logan 19s chin was quivering at the possibility of losing his brand new cow boy boots.

Even after reading 2284 books (please see my resume and Spectacular Books. www. webcitymcp.com/blog.) this scene struck a deep chord within me.

In my hard, desperate, yet colorful childhood, I didn 19t have money for much any thing. Like Boy 19s Life - Robert McCammon 19s hero, Cory Mackenson, I had a rust heap cycle, a parrot, a cage of budgerigars and a loyal dog, Copper, that 19s all.

Like Logan and Alison I longed for many things in vain. Inherent defects prevented me from attending school until age sixteen in 1987. I read 146 books until age 17. But from 17 to 39, 2074. I am born defective. I survived 5 surgeries. Three more pending.

. 1CLibrary is poor man's university 1D- john Jakes 13 California Gold. Joseph Manimala

Bland as shit.

Another abridged John Saul audiobook I listened to at the gym that I can't imagine ever reading in unabridged form. Lee Meriwether(!) gives a more inspired performance than the woman who read the other one but this one's yet another clunker, what with its 4th-quarter-Hail-Mary-pass-of-a-plot explanation involving some lame Military experiment gone awry. Kept on picturing the kid as Albert from Little House on the Prairie.

Earlier this year (2023), I read my first John Saul novel, Creature. Today, I finished my second and last.

Creature wasn't particularly good, but the writing was interesting enough that it kept me entertained while reading it. So, as I was getting ready to go on a weekend getaway, I decided I wanted something simple and entertaining to read for the trip. You know, an airport book (even though I wasn't flying anywhere).

Well, I started this book nearly 20 days ago and it's taken me forever to finish as it became more and more of a slog. Also, Creature had a lot of problems, but the writing was breezy enough that I could dash through it. Here, the writing felt incredibly repetitive and redundant and I'm certain I could easily edit this down 100 pages (from 350 to 250). There's that much unnecessary text. I couldn't believe how many times the reader is given the same information over and over again.

I'm honestly surprised this book's rating is as high as it is and I was originally going to give it two stars, but the ending is so bad, I just can't.

A quick non-spoiler note about the ending -- the story isn't even wrapped up properly. After slogging through all the pages, there's no solid conclusion that felt satisfactory.

SPOILER -- This applies to both Guardian and Creature

It's funny how both books have almost the same ending - a child changed into monster who is alone and still on the loose in the mountains. Both books just leave you hanging as to their fate. In the case of Creature, it felt more satisfying because that child, a product of an experiment he never agreed to, finds his way to freedom. Here, it's just like we read a 350 page prelude to an upcoming horror story that never happens. Now there's this werewolf on the loose, but whatever. No ending, no redemption, no real horror either. It's all just bland and bloated. There, that's what I've been trying to say -- bland and bloated. Good night.

This book was so good. Creepy and suspenseful right from the start. It had a tight grip on me the whole way through, making me more and more nervous as to what was going to happen with every passing page. There were a few things I saw coming, and others that completely shocked me. I was unsettled the entire time, not sure until near the end of just what was happening. If you like that edge of your seat, nail biting kind of feeling, you need to read this book.

Very, very deadly story! Too many deaths in short time. Main character needs greater development as to her strengths.

Meh. A bit boring.

The characterization in this is pretty solid. I thought the kids especially all had pretty distinct voices from each other. The third person omniscient POV allowed us to get to know all the characters, and Joey and MaryAnne’s heads were particularly enjoyable to hang out in.
I feel like it waited too long to commit to whether or not what was happening was actually otherworldly or not. The later you wait to really introduce that in a story, the more out of place it feels. The explanation was also a government conspiracy, which I don’t think is alluded to beforehand at all. This took some of the bite of the solution to the mystery away from it.
I thought it was a bit odd to have the child who was abused end up being a monster at his core when so many characters still hold so much love for the authority figure that was beating him.
The blizzard sequence is great for horror and tension, and even when we can see what’s coming, the end for these characters still hits hard. There’s a lot of tragedy to the final act of this novel, and since we get every character’s point of view at least a little bit, we feel these deaths with the characters.
I will say the pattern of “Joey’s being normal, Joey starts acting strange, Joey runs away, everyone panics” got a bit old. It’s got to be five or more times that this happens. definitely made the nearly 400 page length feel a little padded.
A good read overall, though.