Billy Summers - Stephen King

[goodreads]

Title: Billy Summers
Author: Stephen King
Genre: Suspense
Rating: 4/5
# pages: 433
Date read: January, 2023

Billy Summers is a man in a room with a gun. He’s a killer for hire and the best in the business. But he’ll do the job only if the target is a truly bad guy. And now Billy wants out. But first there is one last hit. Billy is among the best snipers in the world, a decorated Iraq war vet, a Houdini when it comes to vanishing after the job is done. So what could possibly go wrong?

How about everything...


First book of 2023, and fortunately a good one. It was a bit slow to start, but once it did, I had a hard time putting it down, and found myself reading a page here and there whenever I could.

The atmosphere in the first half reminded me a lot of "11/22/63", but once Billy left Midwood, the similarities stopped, and the book became all its own. I wasn't a huge fan of the "flashbacks" at first, but they ended up being shorter than I had feared, and served a purpose, so in the end it worked for me.

As usual with Stephen King, there were some twists and turns along the way that I hadn't seen coming, and although I'm not quite sure what I think about the ending, I can understand why he made that decision.

The dates at the end of the book puzzled me for quite awhile, as they seemed to have no relevance to the story at all - until I remembered that he often ends a book with the start- and end dates of writing. And it certainly did explain the otherwise completely baffling references to "the virus that would come soon". ...only, now I kinda want to read a book by him actually set during the pandemic, as I'd be interested in seeing his take on that. But perhaps he fears it would be too similar to "The Stand".