{Review} "The Colorado Kid" by Stephen King

Title:  The Colorado Kid
Author:  Stephen King
Publisher:   Simon and Schuster Audio 
Publication Date:  January 1, 2005
Genre:  Mystery
Format:  Kindle, 199 KB

Buy this book:  Amazon
Author's Website:  http://www.stephenking.com/


Synopsis from Goodreads  

On an island off the coast of Maine, a man is found dead. There's no identification on the body. Only the dogged work of a pair of local newspapermen and a graduate student in forensics turns up any clues. But that's just the beginning of the mystery. Because the more they learn about the man and the baffling circumstances of his death, the less they understand. Was it an impossible crime? Or something stranger still-? No one but Stephen King could tell this story about the darkness at the heart of the unknown and our compulsion to investigate the unexplained. With echoes of Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon and the work of Graham Greene, one of the world's great storytellers presents a surprising tale that explores the nature of mystery itself.

Diving In...

I honestly don't have too much to say about this book.  I have been wanting to read it for a long time since it's the inspiration for the TV show Haven.  When they say loosely based they surely mean it!  The only similarities are these

• They are in a waterfront town (actually an island) in Maine
• The 2 newspaper men are Vince and Dave
• The "constable" at the time of the Colorado Kid case had the last name Wournos
• The Colorado Kid case is a mysterious unsolved case

Basically the story is this, a big town newspaper man comes to town looking to write a story along the lines of unsolved mysteries or unexplained phenomena.  Over the years these things have happened in the town, but as Vince and Dave explain them, they have a bit of a straight line follow through.  This means that while they seem mysterious, there are contributing circumstances that could explain the event, even if that's not really what happened.  Those stories all have endings in some way or another.  

Vince and Dave send the newspaper man packing with no more than what she showed up with.  They have a young intern type working with them at the newspaper and she has been around enough to know that they are keeping something from him.  She gets them to tell her the story of The Colorado Kid.  They are not going to give this story to the reporter because it's just to opposite type of story.  They have been thinking about and working on this case for over 20 years, but even to them it's still not a straight line story.  They spend the afternoon and evening relaying all the information they have gathered.

If you are looking for a happy ending, case solved type of story you aren't going to find it here!  There are clues given all throughout the story, but it more a story of the need to find out what happened as opposed to actually finding out what happened.  It's about how some things resonate with certain people while others just read the headline in the paper and don't give it another thought.

This is actually my first Stephen King story, but I know it won't be my last.  I really enjoyed the mystery of this story and it's definitely worth a read even if you haven't heard of Haven.

Rating 7/10