Stephen King’s supernatural-free foray into crime fiction may not offer anything new, but I still enjoyed his take on a good old-fashioned thriller.
I tend to have a very haphazard way with crime book series. I got around to this novel after I already watched the underrated Mr Mercedes TV series with Brendan Gleeson, and after I already discovered the ultimate fate of its hero from End of Watch, the final entry in the Bill Hodges trilogy. With no surprises left and all the twists and turns already in my memory, I was all the more impressed with the book keeping me on the edge of the seat regardless.
The book opens in the midst of the 2009 recession, as the desperate unemployed in an unnamed midwestern city gather overnight for their chance at a job fair. But it’s best to not get attached to any characters introduced, because at dawn, a luxury Mercedes emerges from the morning fog and ploughs through the densely packed queue, killing eight people and maiming many more. The killer behind the wheel manages to escape and the police investigation leads nowhere.
Bill Hodges, the detective on the case, is now retired from the force and not taking it well. He spends his days watching trash TV and drinking beer, with his Smith & Wesson revolver always on the table where he can see it. His slow march towards suicide is then interrupted by a letter from the Mercedes Killer himself, clearly written in order to give Hodges that final nudge. Instead, it jolts Hodges back into action. He doesn’t report the letter, instead he decides to strike out on his own in the finest tradition of maverick detectives, and so begins the cat-and-mouse chase and online psychological battle.
This is no whodunnit and Hodges’ opponent is revealed to the reader almost immediately. Just like Hodges, 28-year-old Brady Hartfield fits squarely within the tropes of the genre, an unassuming-looking psychopath with dark personal history and a seriously messed up relationship with his mother. Despite his assurances in the letter to Hodges that he’s a one-off killer, it’s pretty obvious that Hartfield is not going to retire. Hodges and his band of misfits, including the recurring characters like computer-savvy, Harvard-bound Jerome Robinson and shy, socially awkward Holly Gibney, must race against time before another deadly attack happens.
I’ve always enjoyed King’s small-town realism and his ability to get inside his characters’ minds, whether they’re ordinary or extraordinary, decent or depraved. Brady Hartfield is one sick, depraved puppy indeed and his ordinary appearance is what makes him terrifying. This is a rare instance where having watched the TV series probably enhanced my read, because Luke Treadaway’s chilling performance as Brady was definitely at the back of my mind the whole time. Likewise, Brendan Gleeson’s turn as Hodges helped colour in the book character, who I found perfectly solid but not especially distinctive on paper.
Though the book is not too graphic, King still has a way with a grotesque death scene and a phrase like strawberry jam in a sleeping bag. As with many other of his novels, I felt like Mr Mercedes stumbled ever so slightly at the very end, weirdly deflating at a moment when it should have been at its most suspenseful. Still, the book had me in its grip until then, so it’s a minor complaint. I now look forward to reading Finders Keepers and maybe revisiting End of Watch.
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