Reader Score
92%
92% of readers
recommend this book
Critic Reviews
Good
Based on 8 reviews on
Holly Gibney, one of Stephen King's most compelling and resourceful characters, returns in this chilling "exploration of grief and delusion, just pure undistilled evil" (New York magazine) as she uncovers the truth behind multiple disappearances in a midwestern town.
When Penny Dahl calls the Finders Keepers detective agency, hoping for help locating her missing daughter, Holly Gibney is reluctant to accept the case. Her partner, Pete, has Covid. Her (very complicated) mother has just passed away. And Holly is meant to be on leave. But something in Penny's desperate voice makes it impossible to turn her down.
Meanwhile, mere blocks from where Bonnie Dahl disappeared live Professors Rodney and Emily Harris. They are the picture of bourgeois respectability: married octogenarians, devoted to each other, and semi-retired lifelong academics. But they are also harboring a shocking, unholy secret in the basement of their well-kept, book-lined home, one that may be related to Bonnie's disappearance. And it will prove nearly impossible to discover what they are up to...for they are savvy, they are patient, and they are ruthless. Now Holly must summon all of her formidable talents to outthink and outmaneuver these unimaginably depraved and brilliantly disguised adversaries in this chilling and unforgettable masterwork from Stephen King.
"What makes King’s work so much more frightening than that of most other suspense writers…isn’t his cruelty to his characters: It’s his kindness…You can sense the goodness running through them, and that current of goodness is what makes the acts of violence so disturbing."
"Stephen King does something amazing in his new novel, HOLLY... King's storytelling skills are not dimming one bit." --Tampa Bay Times
"Hugely successful... Holly surely deserves further episodes in the spotlight." -- Portland Press Herald
"Holly has a thrilling finish, in which our heroine looks horror in the face. The outcome is most satisfying." --St Louis Post-Dispatch
"What makes King's work so much more frightening than that of most other suspense writers, what elevates it to night-terror levels, isn't his cruelty to his characters: It's his kindness." --Flynn Berry, New York Times Book Review
"Both intimate and sprawling in its ambitions... Holly is the imperfect but determined angel among all those demons..." --Brian Truitt, USA Today
"Holly is the heart of the narrative. Her growth from a shy, muttering mess in Mr. Mercedes to the smart, strong, smoking, slightly better, and much richer woman we see in Holly is tremendous. Please, Mr. King, give us more Holly soon." --Gabino Iglesias, NPR.org
"In half a century of writing horror novels, Stephen King has created some remarkable villains. Who can forget the sing-song voice of Pennywise the clown, the devil incarnate Randall Flagg, or the drooling jaws of Cujo? The big bads in King's latest novel, Holly, aren't quite so memorable, but that's part of what makes them terrifying." --Rob Merrill, Associated Press
"A deadly folie a deux... Holly pursues this case to the gates of hell, figuratively--there's no supernatural element in this powerful exploration of grief and delusion, just pure, undistilled evil." --New York Magazine