Mr. X by Peter Straub

I was riveted to the first half of this book. The mystery Robert's (Ned's dop) true identity, his malevolence, his intentions regarding Ned kept me reading. I was also fascinated with Ned's dropping into another dimension every year on his birthday, and how, in one chapter, Ned sees through the demon's eyes. Ned is a very sympathetic character, because he has integrity, is a good guy, and has suffered during his life at the hands of his Dop (his yearly seizures on his birthday.)

Then when I found out that Robert wasn't a threat, but more or less wanted to be Ned's buddy in finding Mr. X, their father, my interest started to wane.

The father, Edward Rinehardt, didn't pose a significant enough threat to Ned to hold my interest. In the final encounter with their father, Rinehardt hardly put up a fight. To me the novel got bogged down in peripheral characters and long-lost relatives, which became so involved I had to make a list to keep it all straight. It got tedious keeping track of the many names of Mr. X, and after awhile I didn't care any more and wanted the book to be over.

Although it was stated clearly that the entire family had magical powers, I never fully understood the reason for Robert's demonic nature. Though Robert was Ned's twin who was abducted at birth, he was depicted as a supernatural/demonic being while the rest of the family was able to perform magical feats here and there, but was basically human.

In the beginning I thought that Mr. X was Robert and later learned that it was their father, Edward Rinehardt.

Granted, Peter Straub is a masterful writer. His concealment until the middle of the book that the main characters were black was pretty nifty. The characterization of Ned's family was realistic, quirky, entertaining and rang true; I had a definite mental picture of these people, and the details of the setting were superb.

The opening was a grabber. The beginning chapters from the point of view of Mr. X were enigmatic and fascinating. His use of inventive similes and metaphors throughout the book was inspiring.

I think where Straub falls short is he didn't keep the suspense at a high enough pitch. It was genuinely difficult for me to keep awake during the last twenty or so pages of wrap up.

Something else that decreased the effectiveness of Mr. X was that Ned never seemed very scared of anything. He took everything so much in stride that I never felt he was actually at risk. (I noticed this same thing in Rose Red, the Stephen King miniseries. The characters were never scared, so why should we be?)

Straub plays with the convention of the evil doppelganger. Even though Robert starts out being evil, he later becomes Ned's friend, and they join together to overcome Mr. X, their father.

What I learned from this book that I can apply to my own writing:

The idea of having a "switch" occur a few times in a novel is very appealing to me. At first we thought Robert was Ned's enemy, then we realized he wasn't. Their father was. Though Edward Rinehardt was a very interesting character, he wasn't a formidable enough of an antagonist to make me care.

I liked Straub's point of view switches between Ned, Robert and Mr. X. That is something I am using in my book. Although he used first person, which I really prefer, I thought it would be confusing to have point of view shifts in first person.

I had been thinking about making the Dop in my own story develop a personality of her own and end up being Rosalind's friend. But since I lost interest in Mr. X when Peter Straub did this (and I am nowhere near the writer Peter Straub is) I doubt that I would be able to carry it off. I would have to make Rosalind's ex-boyfriend, Jack, and his followers even more terrifying than the Dop.

Stephen King says to keep the door shut as long as possible so we can't see the, monster, and he's right. Once everything was revealed, I lost the impetus to continue reading. If I hadn't been reading this book for a class assignment, I probably would have abandoned it midway through. My question is, how do you keep the reader interested until the end of the book?

In some of the early Ann Rice vampire novels, the characters are so enthralling that I continued reading to find out what happened to them. I never at any point thought the characters were in any real danger.

I think the most important thing is to make the reader care about the characters. I read a wide range of books. They don't all have characters that are in danger, but if I care about the characters I continue reading.