Simply Odd
By Preston Sinclair
"You are destined to be together forever"
I didn't want 'Saint Odd' to end. At the same time I was desperate to find out what happened. I was so conflicted. This Dean Koontz novel bills itself as the stunning conclusion to the Odd Thomas series, but is it really? I hope not.
I love Oddie. He's painfully earnest and that's a rare thing these days. He confronts the depths of hell with wink and nod that let's the reader know everything's going to be okay. Or maybe it won't. He doesn't know for sure.
My paperback edition of 'Saint Odd' included a bonus of the original short story called 'You Are Destined To Be Together Forever'. It's what one might call a prequel and it sets the stage for all of the Odd Thomas novels to follow. I love short stories, and this one is brilliant.
On the surface, the card which Odd Thomas and Stormy received from The Gypsy Mummy proclaims that "You are destined to be together forever." This sounds prophetic. Yet it begs the question, is our destiny also our fate? There's a certain vagueness about the card's inscription to which Odd Thomas pinned all his hopes and fears. The card never said, 'You will be together forever.' It didn't even imply that he and Stormy should be together forever. Many factors can intervene to change one's destiny.
The terrorist attack at the mall in Pico Mundo changed Odd Thomas's destiny forever. Therefore it becomes an existential question, "What is forever?" Is it only this life we are living, or does it include the next realm?
As always with Odd Thomas this is a chase story. He's in a race against time. At times one wonders when this boy has time to eat drink or go to the bathroom during his race with evil. I don't pretend to have the answer. The malevolent 'evil doers' take the form of carnies and bungling idiots who are just out to wreak havoc. It's not clear that any of them know what they are doing. The force behind all of this mayhem is never really revealed. In order to fully understand 'Saint Odd' you need to read 'Deeply Odd' which sets the stage and introduces the characters. The idea of evil existing in another dimension, a realm parallel to ours gains traction as Oddie vacillates between a dream state and reality.
Anyone who has experienced night terrors knows what it's like to read an Odd Thomas novel. That feeling that someone, or something is sitting beside your bed watching you sleep, mewling and drooling over you until you wake up kicking and screaming and falling out of bed. Odd Thomas called them 'bodachs'.
Odd Thomas experienced a horrific loss when Stormy was killed. She was his life. He hoped to have a family with her and that was taken away by a terrorist gun. Everything that ensues is Odd Thomas' journey with grief. Our culture likes to set a time limit on the grieving period. It could be one minute, or it could be forever. That's for each of us to decide. Tell Odd Thomas to 'get over it' at your own risk.
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