The Outsider

I was really into the first 1/3-1/2 of this book. It was all laid out super nicely. Guy gets accused of murder. All of the evidence points directly at him with absolutely no room for an alibi. However, the guy actually has an airtight alibi, so what's going on? This all leads to the oft-repeated line in the book: a man can't be in two places at once.

Let's backtrack a bit. The Mr Mercedes trilogy came and went. As the reader may or may not know, the first two books in the series are more straight up crime novels while the third dabbles in the supernatural. It's also no secret that Holly Gibney takes over the helm as King's go-to investigator. This was well advertised when The Outsider came out.

Holly is thrown into this novel around the halfway mark. I wouldn't exactly say it's necessary. In fact, it does feel a bit shoehorned in. As others have noted, her appearance is about the time book took a turn for the worse.

At this point, the reader still has about 250 pages left. Whereas the story of Terry Maitland is super interesting, the rest of the novel just sort of exists for no other reason than for Stephen King to drop every Kingsian trope he knows. The reveal of the killer and everything leading up to the ending has been done by King ad nauseum.

I'm giving this a 2.5, so I'm rounding up to 3. I'd honestly recommend skipping this one if you've never ready the Mr Mercedes trilogy or if you hated the third book. However, feel free to read it if you just want some mindless fun, I guess.