Dark color, dull read; wake me when it's over...
341568
Concur w/ others that this is a short story masquerading as a book.  Making matters worse is a protagonist who, if he did anything other than compound chemicals, the reader gets no sense of it.  Either a cleverly disguised interesting individual or yet another fantastically dull Victorian.  The book is poorly organized to boot, w/ attempts at being current falling very flat.  Disappointing book - not the author's best.
2832068
I read this book a few weeks ago and although I am a huge Stephen King fan, I did not like this book at all. I found this book extremely dull and boring, as I really could not remain interested after the first story. There were a few OK stories in here, but over all this book moved slower than any of his other books and by far was the most dull of his short story collection. While I find King's short stories to be really crummy as it is, this book did nothing more but confirm my dislike for these works. In all honesty, I really tried to like this book and I really tried to force myself to remain interested... but that was all in vein, I just couldn't do it.. this book was just too slow moving.

The stories are as follows:

Willa (4/5): Guy and wife are in a train accident, and are separated. The guy wants to go to town to find his wife, but the town is located through a treacherous stretch of desert. When they reach town they find each other in town, no one talks to them and the find out some real surprises about themselves. Great ending, would have been better if it was faster paced.

Gingerbread Girl (1/5): A woman has an obsession with running and uses running as a stress reliever after her divorce. She runs to an abandoned lot and finds a blood trail leading out of a car that belongs to a local gangster. She is kidnapped by him. Does she get revenge?

Harvey's Dream (2/5): Harvey and his wife have dreams that tell the future and come true... Been there done that.

Rest Stop (1/5): Guy is driving down the road and has to use the toilet. He gets to a rest stop and hear a scene of domestic violence in the bathroom. What does he do?

Stationary Bike (1/5): Guy becomes a health nut and buys a stationary bike. As he works out he starts to have odd dreams and starts to paint them. As he has more dreams they get more disturbing. He starts to envision himself in his paintings and reacting with the characters in a negative light... The end is an ok surprise. Think of it as a short crummy version of Rose Madder.

The Things They Left Behind (1/5): 9/11 survivor has horrible visions and "survivors guilt" of the attack. Stuff starts randomly appearing in his house.. read it to find out why and what he does.

Graduation Afternoon (5/5): One of the few that I liked. Girl is at a party with her boyfriend and they witness the event of "explosive" a lifetime. Very Stand meets Watchmen- esque

N.: Another one of my favorites (5/5). A clear Lovecraft ripoff. Psychiatrist commits suicide after seeing a patient labeled only as N. N. claims to see a doorway to a parallel universe in which he meets a Chutlu type creature. He named the creature Cthun... RIP OFF!

The Cat From Hell (2/5): Hit man is sent to go kill a cat. Cat is crazy and violent as hell. Pretty Violent, pretty fast paced. Think Cujo, but not nearly as good.

The New York Time at Special Bargain Rates (2/5): Wife gets call from dead husband. Husband predicts bad things. His wife next? Think The Girl Who Loved Tim Gordon.

Mute (1/5): Guy picks up a hitch hiker who claims to be deaf. He vents to the "sleeping" deaf hitchhiker about his wife who had an affair. Hitchhiker leaves when the driver goes to the bathroom. I think you can guess what the hitchhiker did...

Ayana (1/5): Guy is dying. Guy meets mysterious child with healing powers. Think Green Mile. Ugh boooooring!

A Very Tight Place (2/5): A guy is having legal battles with his neighbor. Neighbor lures him to construction site and locks him in a porta-potty to die. He vows revenge for the incident when he gets out...

If you feel compelled to read it, definately pick it up from the library, if I had the choice again, I would skip it and would have picked something else..
4887360
It started out with an interesting concept, but quickly crashed and burned because of how it was written. First of all it was dragged out, and those parts were so boring I skipped them almost entirely. The author also fails to show rather than tell, and as a result I found it incredibly hard to empathize with the characters. In the end I stopped caring about any of them and quit reading. Couldn't stay awake to finish.
3955310
I love to read and I read many genres. I heard that this book was good so I put it in my "queue" to read. I've literally been waiting for 2 to 3 years to find the time to read this book.

I fell asleep reading this book many times, too my horror, forcing me to re-read many portions of the book. No plot, no character development, horrible writing style. Too much use of "10 dollar" words. The dialogue was hard to follow and subjects seemed to switch at random.

So disappointed.
46933
Very thin.  The main storyline -- the "mystery" -- involves little more than Aunt Dimity asking Lori to find a person with nothing more to go on except that he frequented a tea shop in Bloomsbury more than 60 years ago.  Lori goes to London to the place where the tea shop used to be, asks a few questions, waits for some regulars to show up, and a few days later, voila!  She finds her man.  Not much to hang a book on.  Would have made a better short story.

The rest is fluff and filler.  The storyline of the newcomers to the village is a non-starter.  I am perplexed as to why Lori doesn't know the name of a "metal detector," and how unfamiliar she is with it.  (Are we really expected to believe that the entire village would show up for a demonstration of how one works?)

Most of the rest of it is filled with mind-numbingly dull bits of information about metal detecting, the years immediately after WWII, Anglo-Saxon history, the baby's diaper again (surely Lori would have referred to them as 'nappies,' not 'diapers' as she has lived in England over 10 years, and all her children born there.  She calls a 'buggy' a 'pram,' right?), and how enchanted the entire village continues to be with a baby who spends her days being picked up and passed around whenever Lori encounters a group of people.

Lori, frankly, has grown into a dull thing . . . a bit of a ninny actually.  I'm surprised her dashingly handsome, well-educated, career-oriented husband hadn't cut strings fled years ago.

I re-read earlier works in the series now and then, and continue to find them as enchanting and captivating as ever.

This installment of a once-beloved series, however, is dry as toast.  Very little to recommend it except perhaps to pass the time in a doctor's waiting room  ... unless the magazines are miraculously up to date, whereby you might want to opt for the magazines.
4643378
This book is boring!! Not a fan of the new characters. I have fallen asleep on at least three separate occasions reading the book. I already bought it so I will finish it, but due to the content, it will be tough to get through. The three books in the series were fun of suspense and very exciting. This book has ruined it for me.
3171053
I'm a little over half-way through this novel, and all I can say is "slow, boring".  Even though I haven't finished the book, I think I've got a feel for it, and the last half of what I have read (a middle quarter) has been absolutely "un-King-like".

Don't believe the hype here at amazon - sure there are more than a few, diehard, "always-a-5-star-rating" Stephen King fans, but there are also a few cronies who "review" items for the benefit of the publisher.  Without any agenda, I can say this is just a big, fat, DULL.

I'll modify this review later, if the book surprises me.

EDIT: I finished this book today.  My opinion remains the same.  This was definitely a *SLOW* read.  Would give it a 1/2 star if I could.  Otherwise, I generally like/love King's novels.
4930333
This was one of those novels that I wanted to like more than I did. A "smart" well-written mystery with an intriguing plot. Sounds like a winner, right? Well, obviously a lot of other readers DID like this one, and liked it a lot. But I found the tone of the novel much too dark and foreboding. Not enough lightness or humor, and too much of a creepy vibe for my tastes. Plus, I didn't feel any real connection with characters. A clever story, but maybe too much so?

On the plus side, Verdon has a confident, smooth writing style. Parts of this novel seem OVER written to me, as if he's trying too hard, but he's certainly not dumbing down his prose like many contemporary "thriller" writers are doing nowadays. Also, the premise of this mystery is indeed one that will hook many readers. Unfortunately, I got to the point where I just didn't care what happened. I just wanted all of these annoying characters to go away!
1497842
"The Cat From Hell" and "A Very Tight Place" were two great stories that I read a couple times.  "Stationary Bike" was a boring read, but it did make me think afterward, and it was actually good enough of a high-level plot that I read it a second time and enjoyed thinking about how it would relate to my real-life.

"Willa" was interesting, and had a nice twist, but otherwise, left me feeling empty.  "Mute" was a good read, but not something I would read twice.  The rest of the stories were different degrees of bad.  The worst story I have ever read was "Graduation Afternoon".  I don't care about hidden meanings, morals, etc.  That story just plain stunk.  "The Gingerbread Girl" was a long, brutal read with a predictable ending.  "Harvey's Dream" was an OK read, but I could have written the ending.  "Rest Stop" left me with serious blue balls...I mean, can we have a decent ending on any of these stories???  "The Things They Left Behind" would have been better if it spent more time on connecting with the families and less time on a woman who was pretty meaningless to the story yet was talked about like she was important.  "The New York Times..." story was predictable and just plain dumb.  "Ayana" was boring, long, and very predictable...getting the overall theme of this book?  PREDICTABLE...BORING.

Finally, "N." was long, prodding dreck.  I mean, come on.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE "The Plant".  It was a great read.  Some people have said it was too long, but it was good.  It was great.  It was suspensful.  This?  Terrible.  Boring.  Too much writing about the hay and the sky and the river and the trees and the blah, blah, blah, blah.

Overall, this book is way overrated here.  I am a BIG BIG fan of Stephen King.  I have read all his books.  I have Langoliers and The Stand DVR'd on my cable box and watch them again and again.  I love King.  Anymore than 2 stars is too much for this one.
2164162
Around October Reese Witherspoon recommend a novel titled "in a dark, dark wood," the summary sounded interesting, so I kept it in mind. Overall, this book was very one-dimensional. Mysteries/thrillers are by far my favorite genre. Therefore, it wasn't hard to pick up on the textbook clues. No phone reception, mysterious footsteps, and a random firearm. I waited for the shocking moment in the text, but I was let down. I enjoyed the relationship between Nina and Nora. I also thought the hospital scenes were good.

SPOILER: Honestly, after James was killed I called Clare as the murderer. Flo was too easy, she was basically asking for the murder to be pinned on her. Personally, I think Nina would have made a much more interesting storyline!

Unless we are to expect a sequel, the worst part of the story was the ending! It was completely random.

Basically, not bad...not great.
2367853
Dull and anti-climactic. Sorry :o(  Think I'll stick to Zombie Apocalypse books, and the Hunger Games and Divergent - type series.
3152908
This book very fully developed the dullest and most boring non-central characters. I spent the entire novel waiting for one of the interesting central characters of the previous plotlines to reappear and was mostly disappointed. Instead of resolving and nurturing the various subplots as needed, the author went in an entirely different direction. Warning: any writing involving Danaerys is a total yawn. Very glad that I didn't waste $28 on this hardcover, just sorry that the person who gave it to me as a gift did. Please, let book 5 be less of a snore!
3986687
Dark? Just twisted and poorly written. Survived half of the first  book and deleted it. Spare your free time... (And seriously, why dragging it over so many books?!)
3588853
Well this book was definitely a mind numbing boring snoozer.
I read the raving reviews before purchasing - no argument that it had great potential, but it failed in my opinion in the execution. The authors Dom Eli, was more an emotionally scarred Switch, and her submissive hero Justin, read like a woman-child rather than a man-child (Which is bad enough), whos also emotionally scarred.

There really wasn't anything remarkable about the characters. Both were annoyingly dull. By the time the two got their sob stories out, I had pretty much checked out mentally and wanted the story to end. Unfortunately it didntit limped along a few more chapters, and then we got an Epilogue that came of as cheesy ..By the way Ms. Zabo, you may want to put phrases and words like Are you okay Shudder, shuddered, shiver and startled on your Crutch Word a.k.a Words I Use a lot List.
2737386
Boring, boring, boring. The only reason I read the entire story was that I have made a vow to finish every book I start. If not, I would have quit about 10 pages in. I can remember thinking while I was reading it my kindle "wow, it says 25% done and NOTHING has happened!" And nothing does happen the entire story. A suspense novel?!?!??! Certainly this is one of the 3 worst stories I have ever read, and certainly the worst I have read on my kindle of 2 years.
658497
This has to be one of the most boring books I have ever read. It doesn't make me feel anything other than sleepy. Goodnight.
3537213
What can I say about this poorly written, predictable, tedious "thriller"? None of the characters is likable or well developed; the tone is morose; the pace drags, there's almost no suspense. Usually I find something to like in a book, but I struggled to finish this one. At least the last 20 pages weren't as dull as the rest of the book. So, I guess that's a positive. The hours I spent reading this book are "black hours" I'll never get back.