Bingo: One. Two distinct storylines come together as one.
You have to push through to the bitter end. No flinching, no turning away.
it amazes me sometimes how long I’ve been reading Stephen King. At least since 12 years old, I think and I’m 57 now. I haven’t read everything but I’ve read a lot. Never Flinch was enjoyable if a little repetitive in places (King could always use a little editing). It’s part of what started out as the Bill Hodges series, and now the Holly Gibney series as she took over Hodges’s private investigator business.
This is one of those books where you know who the bad guys are right away. The mystery isn’t so much about the who as it is about the how. Which means it’s a little anticlimactic at the end but there is a decent amount of suspense throughout, with the occasional lag.
A serial killer called Trig is killing off innocent people one by one. His reasoning is convoluted and doesn’t quite make sense. There is a prisoner who was framed for a crime. While he is in prison he is killed by another inmate. Trig is avenging his needless death by killing 14 innocent people who represent those responsible for his false conviction: the 12 jurors, the judge, and the prosecutor. It’s some kind of baffling twist on the “better 10 guilty men go free than one innocent man” idea. In Trig’s mind, better the innocent die to make the guilty suffer. It really doesn’t make any sense, but I guess we need to write it off as a crazy antagonist’s thinking.
Detective Izzy Jaynes pursues the Surrogate Jury Killer, while in a different storyline Holly is hired as a bodyguard to a fiery feminist speaker called Kate McKay who is being pursued by a violent pro-life stalker who abhors Kate’s influence and is trailing her on her speaking tour. We soon learn who the stalker is while we follow Holly’s attempts to keep Kate safe.
The stories eventually come together and Holly is hot on the trail to thwart disaster and save multiple lives. I won’t spoil if she manages to save anyone. In a refreshing turn of events, King does not botch his Black characters. He usually makes me cringe like crazy in this regard, but brava to him for avoiding lame jokes or caricatures.
Overall I found this a diverting read. There’s no horror, just a suspenseful plotline. That’s good enough for me.
