July 31st, 2008
Review – Dexter in the Dark
Dexter in the Dark
by Jeff Lindsay
It’s sad to see such a good series descend to this level. This book was a real disappointment. It’s hard to know where to start but the overall premise of the book, that Dexter’s “Dark Passenger” is actually a supernatural possession by some kind of child of Moloch an eternal something-or-other, lacks so much believability that it ruins the entire series. What made the first two books so good was that Dexter was the sociopath trying to live in the real world. His “Dark Passenger” was simply a different part of Dexter’s personality. The success of the books was that we rooted for Dexter and his “Dark Passenger” in spite of him being a sociopath. But how can we root for some horrible monster that possesses Dexter and forces him to kill?
But Lindsay goes too far even with his idea of how someone becomes a sociopath. Every child, at least according to Lindsay, who is abused as a child, grows up to be a serial killer. Rita’s two kids both become sociopaths because they were abused by their father. But that isn’t how it happens in the real world. Not all serial killers were abused and not everyone who is abused becomes a serial killer. We can root for Dexter when he is unique and only killing other serial killers, but how can we root for him to create more serial killers? Dexter should be sending the children for intense psychotherapy, not lessons in how to kill.
And worst of all, the book is simply boring. Nothing much happens. There are murders but it is impossible to keep straight who is killing who and the murders (and murderers) are almost irrelevant. We hear more about donuts and wedding caterers than we do about anything else. And there really is no mystery in the story. We find out in the first pages of the book who did it although I kept hoping that the book wasn’t really going to be this stupid and that Lindsay would give us some other surprise solution. I am fairly confident that this is the last Dexter book I will be reading.
Tags: books, review, Dexter in the Dark
