End of Watch (Bill Hodges Trilogy, #3)

by Stephen King

The cell rings twice, and then his old partner in his ear... 'I'm at the scene of what appears to be a murder-suicide. I'd like you to come and take a look. Bring your sidekick with you, if she's available...'

Retired Detective Bill Hodges now runs a two-person firm called Finders Keepers with his partner Holly Gibney. They met in the wake of the 'Mercedes Massacre' when a queue of people was run down by the diabolical killer Brady Hartsfield.

Brady is now confined to Room 217 of the Lakes Region Traumatic Brain Injury Clinic, in an unresponsive state. But all is not what it seems: the evidence suggests that Brady is somehow awake, and in possession of deadly new powers that allow him to wreak unimaginable havoc without ever leaving his hospital room.

When Bill and Holly are called to a suicide scene with ties to the Mercedes Massacre, they find themselves pulled into their most dangerous case yet, one that will put their lives at risk, as well as those of Bill's heroic young friend Jerome Robinson and his teenage sister, Barbara. Brady Hartsfield is back, and planning revenge not just on Hodges and his friends, but on an entire city.

The clock is ticking in unexpected ways ...

Both a stand-alone novel of heart-pounding suspense and a sublimely terrifying final episode in the Hodges trilogy, End of Watch takes the series into a powerful new dimension.

The extract above is abridged from End of Watch.

(P) 2016 Simon & Schuster

• ISBN10: 1594139733
• ISBN13: 9781594139734
• Publish Date: 4 April 2017 (first published 7 June 2016)
• Publish Status: Unknown
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Large Print Press
• Edition: Large type / large print edition
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Language: English

Reviews

[Whitney @ First Impressions Reviews]

End of Watch by Stephen King is the end of the Bill Hodges Trilogy I very much enjoyed the first two in the series and looked forward to reading the last installment. One year after its release I am finally getting around to reading it.

All my favorite characters returned one last time. Jerome and of course Holly make appearances and are just as lively as ever. Holly is such a likeable neurotic with Jerome and Bill keeping her from going over the deep end creating a nice, entertaining balance.

Brady, our "Mr Mercedes" makes a comeback from his Brain injury and just in time for Bill Hodges (and the reader) to gain some closure.

Besides the characters, I enjoyed the build-up to Brady's capture, it is just as cleverly constructed as it's predecessors with a riveting conclusion that reminded me of the ending of the film adaptation of Silence of the Lambs.

Will Patton gave a good narration, I'm not sure if he is a narrator I would actively follow but he kept the story moving and played the characters well.

Overall, End of Watch was a worthy ending to The Bill Hodges Trilogy and leaves the reader feeling satisfied.

This review was originally posted on First Impressions Reviews

[clq]

Annoyingly, this book was both good and disappointing. After Mr. Mercedes and Finders Keepers my expectations for this last book of the trilogy were very high. They weren't met.

The Stephen King books I've read have tended to fall roughly into one of two categories: the fantasy/supernatural, and the relatively natural thriller/horror, with a touch of the supernatural here and there. The thing that I've appreciated so much in the latter category, into which the two first books of this trilogy fell, is the plot itself being driven mostly by rational events, with the supernatural and weird being used to spice up the story here and there. It has added a very effective layer of unsettling uncertainty to a universe that has been normal enough to identify with.

End of Watch bases the plot entirely on a pretty major supernatural conceit. This could have worked, had it not been for the extent and the significance of the conceit being revealed gradually. Instead of the twists being based on events in the story itself, the twists are mostly based around revelations about how the "rules of the universe" actually work. This didn't work for me.
There is also an annoyingly unnecessary lack of realism in some of the tech-aspects. I don't mind stories leaping over technical realism when it adds to the story, I'm fine with "zoom and enhance", but when the errors are mostly irrelevant to the story, and it would have taken half an hour of Googling to make it more realistic, it just seems lazy.
I also think this is the first time in a Stephen King story where I could see the ending coming from a mile away. I expected and hoped that I'd been mislead down the wrong path, but, alas, I hadn't.

All that said, the book is still worthwhile. It has a real warmth to it, and the characters and the interactions between them are, as always, wonderful. Mr. Mercedes and Finders Keepers are excellent, and this is a perfectly fine, if not entirely satisfying, conclusion to a great trilogy.

[clementine]

2.5 stars

Looks like I'm going against the grain here! I'll disclose upfront that I didn't read the other two books in this trilogy (I was bored at work and we had this one so I read it), so that might have an effect on my opinion. However, the plot was definitely coherent without having read the other two and I didn't feel that I had big gaps in my understanding.

I've actually never read any of Stephen King's fiction before. I really liked On Writing - I thought it was interesting, engaging, and funny. I'd actually be interested in reading some of King's more iconic novels, because I really felt like this book was lacking. Personally I don't find his prose particularly amazing - it does the job, but I don't think it's anything to write home about. I've always had the impression that his work is more about the concept and plot than the writing itself.

Although I haven't read any of his other novels (though I have watched the X-Files episode he directed!), I'd say the plot falls a bit short here in comparison to some of his most famous works. Perhaps it's just that I entered this series at the end, but I didn't think the plot was particularly clever. There were no real twists; everything was forecast quite clearly from the beginning. The paranormal element actually seemed quite overdone to me. It was a variation on a theme that I've seen a million times. All in all I didn't think it was particularly thrilling, which is a disappointing coming from probably the most famous living horror/thriller writer. And I thought the end was kind of cheap, to be honest.

The characters were okay - they each had distinct personalities and they were likeable but flawed, but not totally developed. This wasn't really a character-driven book, anyway, and they were probably more developed than they had to be.

This book was really just okay to me. I don't think it was terrible, but overall it was pretty flat.

[kimbacaffeinate]

4.5 sad to see it end