Book Review "The Door to December" by Dean Koontz

Every so often you have to go back and revisit an old Dean Koontz novel and get some good old fashioned chills. Even Dean himself has to do so. This book was originally released in 1985 under Dean's psuedonym Richard Paige but has been re-released under the proper artist's name, Dean Koontz.

This book is a classic Koontz novel. It features the hero with a soiled childhood, in this case Dan Haldane the police detective that takes on they mysterious case of Melanie Rafferty. Melanie is a 9 year old girl who was kidnapped by her father, Dylan, 6 years prior after Melanie's mother, Laura, filed for divorce. The story begins with Dylan's house the scene of a brutal crime in which he and several "occupants" have been found bludgeoned to death. Melanie is found wandering the streets of L.A. naked and in a catatonic state.

Lt. Dan Haldane calls Laura to the scene to try to put together what happened. Laura hasn't seen or heard from her husband and daughter for 6 years. What happened in that 6 years immediately sends a chill up the reader's spine. In this house which was the base of research for Dylan Rafferty, who was a psychologist performed a series of bizarre psychological experiments. To make matters worse it becomes clear that Dylan had been using his daughter as the main subject of his experiments, strapping her to a shock therapy chair and isolating her for hours in a sensory deprivation tank encouraging her to discover the full potential of her psyche.

As the police continue to investigate the murder other bodies start to appear. In each case the victim seems to have been killed in a very extreme way far beyond the abilities of any normal person. At first the victims don't seem to have anything in common but as the investigation continues they start to discover that all of the dead were somehow linked and this link is that something (not someone) is killing those involved in Melanie's experiments. The link also leads to find what was actually being studied and who was funding the experiments.

This is Dean Koontz's classic thrill package wrapped within the covers in this book. A little paranormal activity and great characters to follow to the ultimate battle of the psyche.