I have raved countless times about how much I love Stephen King novels. I love when I hit up one I have never read, though they are becoming fewer in number. Happily, Later was one that I hadn’t dug into yet and it absolutely delighted me.

Later introduces us to Jamie Conklin, a young boy with a unique gift, he sees dead people. And when he talks to them, they always have to tell the truth.

He lives with his single mother, Tia, who works as a literary agent. When Tia’s girlfriend, Liz, a dirty cop, gets him to help with a bomber who has been terrorizing New York. Unfortunately, now the dead bomber is haunting Jamie, but he’s not the bomber anymore, there’s something inside him now, deadlights.

That’s right, deadlights. Suggesting a tie-in with It. And it’s not only tied-in that way, it’s also tied thematically in that it’s also a coming-of-age tale. But I won’t lie, I do live when King ties his novels together, setting them in the same universe.

Which leads to more of a chat about Jamie’s abilities, he’s got a bit of a Danny Torrance thing going on, there’s the deadlights, there’s a direct reference to The Shawshank Redemption, there’s also The Ritual of Chud. Also of interest is the amount of years between the events in the novel, It, and the death of the bomber in this book… twenty-seven years…

It’s a fast-moving tale, and sets things up for more from Jamie, and perhaps, the deadlights, that are now back in the real world again.

But that’s not the only narrative happening here, Liz shows up again and forces Jamie to help her and it goes badly for everyone involved.

It’s a great read, and I couldn’t put it down, knocking it out in a few hours, but wow, I loved this. It marries a lot of what King excels at, his foray into crime thriller and the supernatural, which makes for a really nice blending in his hands.

I hope we hear more from Jamie, or at least more from the deadlights, and the evil they’ll no doubt get up to.

I need to dig into more King soon because man, I love his writing so much. He knows how to tell a story, and I love how creative he gets with his characters, and this one is definitely edging to the scary with some of the things that happens, and some things that Jamie sees.

It’s a very enjoyable read, not quite as massive as some of King’s other tomes, and it may be a great place for new readers to jump into the King-universe. Me, I’ll go looking for a big one now.