Third in the Odd Thomas horror-lite series about a young man needing to retreat from his horrific life.Horror-lite? Yeah, what else can you call it when the story is both warm and creepily weird?My TakeWell, I was dying to know what and why Odd sought out a monastery. And Koontz delivered with warmth and homeyness even as violence broke out. It's an odd mixture of science and the metaphysical, not at all what I would expect. But then, neither is Odd.The peace and vitality with which Koontz invested the monastery and the brothers was very appealing as well as their purpose in aiding the children. A contrast made greater when the bodachs and then the bone man appears. It's creepy how Koontz can---in one sentence---provide warmth and then snatch it away.And yet greater when Koontz points out that medical science has progressed to a point where it's rare for children damaged by "chromosomal abnormalities". Instead, it's parents who don't want to give up their drugs long enough to deliver a healthy child, adults who think nothing of brutally beating a child.As Odd puts it:Hell must be going through a construction boom these days.Okay, I know that the police chief and Father Llewellyn vouched for Odd, but I really can't imagine anyone simply accepting the weird statements Odd makes about the monastery needing to "fortify and defend". No, it's absolutely great that they do, but really, why??Then there's that whole relationship with Romanovich and his interaction with Odd. It's odd, it's weird, it's as though Koontz slipped it in simply to ensure laughter.The StoryEvents in Odd Thomas, 1, and Forever Odd, 2, and the sixteen months since Stormy's death have left Odd unbalanced, and he makes a deal with God to allow him to retreat from the world.But it seems that God has his own agenda in mind for Brother Odd, and it's the bodachs who awaken Odd to potential trouble, followed by the body in the courtyard.Life and Death stalk St. Bart's.The CharactersOdd Thomas is a brilliant fry cook who happens to see dead people and feels compelled to help them find justice. Boo is a white shepherd-mix Odd encounters at the monastery. Bronwen Llewellyn, a.k.a., Stormy, was Odd's girlfriend.St. Bartholomew's Abbey is both monastery and home for disabled children who include Annamarie, ten and trapped in a wheelchair; Justine is partially paralyzed and does not speak (another reason for licensing parents); Walter can play note-perfect any music he hears, but can't speak or care for himself; Jacob Calvino is a beautiful artist, able to draw the emotions people feel, and he's terrified of the Neverwas; and, Flossie Bodenblatt wants to be known as Christmas instead.Sister Angela, the mother superior, and Father Bernard, the abbot, are the only ones who know of Odd's gift. Brother Knuckles, the former Salvatore Giancomo, was a mobster before he saw the light. Brother Timothy takes care of the mechanical systems for the abbey and school. Father Reinhart is the prior. Brother John was once known as John Heineman, a "brilliant physicist...but increasingly a tortured soul". He used his brilliance to amass billions and then retreated. Brother Roland is the guestmaster. Brother Gregory is the infirmarian and helps Brother Norbert with laundry. Brother Leopold is one of the few that Odd doesn't like. Brother Fletcher is the cantor and music director. Brother Quentin was a policeman in his previous life, and he and Brothers Quentin, Alfonse, Augustine, Kevin, Maxwell, and Rupert will be the monastery's defenders. If they can just get them all in one place.Sister Marie Claire and Sister Miriam, a social worker before she entered Holy Orders, are two of the sisters with St. Barts. Brother Constantine is a dead monk who committed suicide and haunts the bell tower. A Reaper haunts the bell tower and the monastery.Rodion Romanovich is the glowering Russian currently staying in the guesthouse, who claims to be a librarian from Indiana. Chief Wyatt Porter, the chief of police in Pico Mundo, California, Odd's hometown, and Father Sean Llewellyn, Stormy’s uncle, keep Odd's secrets and vouche for him. P. Oswald "Little Ozzie" Boone is his hugely fat friend and mentor who wallows in good food as he writes several series of books about detectives. Elvis' ghost hangs with Odd; Odd reckons he hopes "find the courage to move on". The NSA shows up spouting phrases like "rot in prison". Bodachs are supernatural entities which can enter any building, any space and gather wherever "violent or fiery catastrophe is destined to erupt" for "they feed on human suffering". The greater the number of bodachs, the greater the slaughter. Just don't let them even think you know they exist.The CoverThe cover is an interesting blend of the magically metaphysical and religion with its rainbow of yellow-orange-red-violet of stormy cloud effects slanting diagonally across the face of the cover and a brown hooded monk with rope belt.The title succinctly indicates the who and the where, for it's Brother Odd in a monastery.
Mmmm, I dropped an extra star for this one over the first two in the series. Let's go over why:(view spoiler)[It was (sort of inherently) more preachy in this book than the others, with the pro-God pro-Christian thing. The basic conclusion at the end of the book was that trying to use science to better understand God was not only flawed, but blasphemous. Although I myself am an atheist, as someone with a science background who was raised Roman Catholic and still have many friends who do believe in God from many different faiths, I confess to disagree. I suppose if it has been clearer that that was only Odd's distinct interpretation of events rather than the obvious conclusion, I wouldn't have been bothered so much. In sort of the same vein, there was also a full page where Odd muses about the evils of those who are cruel to disabled children, which I started out agreeing with, until he also threw in people who aborted unborn, disabled fetuses. I guess it depends on your view of abortion, really, but I wouldn't myself lump a woman who aborted a child with Down's in with someone who sodomized and attempted to kill a seven-year-old after killing her whole family as equally evil and deserving of eternal torment and damnation, but that's me.The plot was also more hokey and weird. Instead of our normal killer, it's a mad scientest-monk who has created sentient machine-esque creatures made of incomprehensibly complex workings of moving bone to exterminate mostly disabled terminally ill children because he was angry that he once had a kid that was disabled. What?I liked the Russian. He can stay. (hide spoiler)]
What do You think about Brother Odd (2006)?
I love Dean Koontz. I love Odd Thomas. In fact, I love that Dean Koontz loves Odd Thomas enough to write a third (and I'm guessing, soon a fourth) book about him. So I may be a little biased in saying that BROTHER ODD is one of my favorite books of the year. Odd has left Pico Mundo to join the nuns and brothers in a monastery. Although he's not taking his vows, he's been enjoying the peace and quiet--and relative safety--that being with these brothers and sisters of Christ has brought. He's also enjoyed the numerous children who live there, those who are physically or mentally handicapped, abandoned by their parents, sometimes even suffering at their hands. Then, as always seems to be the case with Odd, the bodachs show up, and he knows that something bad has come to the monastery. But does it come from the novices, the brooding Russian, the brother who was once muscle for the Mob, the brother who is also a brilliant scientist, or from someone else entirely? With his faithful dead sidekick, Elvis, and his faithful friends, and the sometimes strange memory and even stranger "spirit" of Stormy, Odd must work to keep the entire population of his new home safe from whatever danger lurks ever nearer. This is another winner from Mr. Koontz, and the ending, of course, leaves it open for another book about the wonderful, amazing, flawed, and utterly lovable Odd Thomas. Well worth picking up, BROTHER ODD will have you reading long into the night.
—Jennifer Wardrip
"Brother Odd" se desarrolla en un entorno originalísimo: son un monasterio de monjes y una abadía de monjas en un mismo recinto, donde viven niños con discapacidad, y un antiguo genio de la física con un laboratorio ultramoderno en los sótanos. Además, siendo Koontz, la novela tiene momentos de tensión y terror geniales: todas las apariciones de los endoesqueletos y del monje sin cara hacen que las páginas vuelen, y los contactos con el más allá son excelentes. Donde falla un poco la novela es en cuestiones de ritmo y en la resolución de la trama.http://www.elrincondecarlosdelrio.com...
—Carlos Río
Having reread Brother Odd, I've decided that I enjoyed this volume more than the first book in the series. In addition to Odd's continuous wit, there's a group of badass monks and nuns who help defend a school of vulnerable children against evil creatury-things that are going to kill them--and if that isn't awesome, then I don't know what is.As I've been rereading this series, I've fallen into long bouts of introspection in which I ponder the human condition much as Odd himself does. Odd is always on the lookout for other people and never does anything for his own pleasure. He helps lingering spirits move on to heaven. He thwarts evil by placing his life at risk to save others.It comes as no surprise to me that the final volume of this series is going to be called Saint Odd. Just as the actual saints who populate history gave of themselves to better mankind, Odd Thomas is one of the most selfless characters that I have ever encountered in fiction.And it's a shame--because so many people are not selfless at all. Yes, there are truly good people and I am thankful for them. But every act of violence seen in the world stems from one basic cause: selfishness. There will never be peace until every human soul turns away from selfishness and places the well-being of others over their own desires.I guess I'll step down from my soapbox now before I've written a novel-length review about the perils of greed and sin and how human arrogance leads to suffering. Maybe I'll write a blog post about it or something. (P.S. Why do they call it a soapbox, anyway? If I stood on the little cardboard boxes that my soap comes in, they would just get squashed flat under my shoes.)
—J.S. Bailey
