“People are blind to explanations that lie outside their perception of reality.”
Browsing through the bookstore, I came across ‘The Outsider’ and reading just those few lines of the blurb, though not having read much of King earlier other than ‘The Shining’, I had to pick it up! And a few pages in, it was an absolute page turner for me. It had been a while since I had read a book like this only because it was literally one of those ‘unputdownable’ books! King’s way of narrating a captivating thriller like The Outsider completely pulls you in and consumes you before you know it.
The boys are on the field and as the excitement is building up it all comes down to a sudden halt as Detective Anderson walks onto the grounds with his men in uniforms, to arrest Terry Maitland, for the gruesome murder of an 11 year old boy. Terry, the town’s adored football coach’s very public arrest not only shocks Maitland himself but has put the community at an anxious discomfort as well.
Terry has a solid alibi, that he was not in town at the time of the murder. With very real evidence and eye witnesses placing him at an event in a different town altogether. However, there are witnesses that have seen him through the day in his town, where the body of the boy was found.
Each character in the book is so well defined and they all seem to have a reason or a purpose being where they are. King makes their mundane routines so intriguing that even two people having beers in the backyard at the end of the day would make the entire scene so interesting to read.
I picked it up thinking it would be just another murder mystery, let's do this! Clearly, I should have know better! The first 300-350 pages were everything! I couldn’t and didn’t want to put this book down. King had laid out the entire plot so elaborately and intricately that every night I wanted to shut the book and keep it away, I could hear my mind saying ’a few more pages’! His writing flows so smoothly that he so easily brings out new twists and turns at the end of every chapter. There were definitely a few scenes that had me slightly terrified and gave sudden jolts, but I guess that’s Stephan King for you.
“Reality is thin ice, but most people skate on it their whole lives and never fall through until the very end. We did fall through, but we helped each other out. We’re still helping each other.”