Just wanted to share opinion on Koontz Phantoms.. kinda loved it

Coming to share my thoughts - I just finished Phantoms. I haven't seen the movie, this is my first Koontz book, and I enjoyed it! I've been seeing some online hate on Koontz and this book but I don't get it. I'm going into a summary of my feelings below, may include spoilers!

Writing style/character development: I found his writing style to be very easy to follow and digestible! I enjoyed the pacing of the story, didn't find that it was dragging on or beating a dead horse. I wasn't able to guess the ending, which is great because I usually can. I found his characters to be as deep as required. Not too much fluff and not too little background. I felt I could clearly understand the main characters easily and they felt genuine to me... As genuine as fictional characters could be in a situation like this.

Reveal: So, the blob! It really was giving, "the blob" or "the thing" but with its own twist. I really really loved how they used past mass disappearances as context in this book. I've always been fascinated by stuff like that, so to see it be utilized here was really interesting to me. Also given the nature of the beast, it was hard to guess what the reveal would be. With all the strange deaths and mysterious findings, it was hard to guess the ending or nature of the monster, which I love. I have a horrible tendency of guessing the endings accurately. It was almost giving, The Thing, Annihilation, and The Mist. Alas, it was something completely different from that! And I really enjoyed the incorporation of religion. At first I thought omg it's literally demon stuff, that's insane, how could that be. But no! I love the idea of this prehistoric, Mesozoic era, ancient 'enemy' creature, that has been interpreted, or created, by humans and their perception of morals and religion. It really made it very interesting. This creature is an ancient beast, so ancient, so feared, so powerful, that anyone who witnessed it could only describe it in a fantastic religious context, an all destroying and all knowing being capable of grand destruction. Whose to say, that is not what a God or devil is? And then the notion of, perhaps this blob is so evil, so comfortable with the self image of evil, simply because it has consumed, those that were evil or those that found it to be evil. Thus, gaining an image of itself. However, despite what Flyte says, I think it was intelligent prior to consuming intelligent beings. It would have to be slightly intelligent to begin this mass consumption in the first place. So the concept of this blob inspiring tales of Satan & others sells this book for me. Very very interesting. And then in the end, the notion of "if the devil exists, God does too" yet we know we aren't referencing a textual devil, but the blob. That line felt like a hint to a god-like blob. Very curious. Maybe not all blobs are evil. Or maybe they are more than blobs. I wish Sarah asked it where it came from, it's origins. I wonder if it has always been terrestrial, if it would know.

Overall, I enjoyed this book! I plan on watching the movie this evening. And I plan on reading more Koontz. I also intend on looking into mass disappearances. That topic has always interested me, and now I'm even more curious!!